


At Least None of Us Have Gills?

by You_Quiznaking_Quiznak



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alteans are more evolved than humans, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bad Science, Before the end of it though, Body Horror, Centaur Lance, Dragon Shiro, I should really be doing homework right now, I've been watching/reading too much sifi, Mythology - Freeform, No missing Shiro, Original paladins - Freeform, Preyton Pidge, Season one paladins, Space Dad Shiro (Voltron), Spoilers for season 4?, Team Voltron Family, The product of sleep deprivation and stress, Troll Hunk, Voltron monster AU, horses and snakes AU with changes, monster au, naga keith, send help
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-25
Updated: 2018-06-25
Packaged: 2019-02-09 15:35:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 44,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12891021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/You_Quiznaking_Quiznak/pseuds/You_Quiznaking_Quiznak
Summary: Pidge had been more than happy to show her brother around the cosmos as soon as he showed interest in seeing some of her “favorite places to visit while up here”. Having been alone on a rebel listening station in the middle of nowhere on nothing but a barren asteroid, he had gotten to experience any alien culture and was itching to do so. However, no one could account for what was going to happen next. Well, maybe Slav. But even then, physical transformations into monsters were less than common.A monster au where everyone is still in space and fighting the galra because who cares about logic!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Why it sucks to be a snake in space](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11964024) by [EboniObsydian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EboniObsydian/pseuds/EboniObsydian). 



> I was reading through different AUs and came across this one through EboniObsydian's work "Why it Sucks to be a Snake in Space". I changed it around a little adding Matt and Making Pidge a Preyton instead of a Gorgon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so you know how I mentioned that technological issues were going to be coming this summer? Yeah I accidentally deleted the first chapter when trying to edit. Hopefully this fixes it.

Pidge had been more than happy to show her brother around the cosmos as soon as he showed interest in seeing some of her “favorite places to visit while up here”. Having been alone on a rebel listening station in the middle of nowhere on nothing but a barren asteroid field, he had not gotten to experience any alien culture and was itching to do so.  
The first stop was the trash nebula as Pidge called it. After the signal that saved that castle was sent from it, the coordinates were now locked into the castle and the green lion.   
Coran identified the aliens there as altean, but he and Allura decided that they were happy there, and should stay. They had after all built an entire ecosystem there and had been for the last 10,000 years. The two also identified the broken craft as an old research station of some kind. Whether or not it was altean was up for debate. It was likely, due to the state that it was in, that it had just been old and, as a result, abandoned. Not attacked. Probably.  
Only Matt and Pidge went that time. Matt absolutely loved the little colorful puffballs. He also had gotten quite a laugh at the sculptures Pidge built of her fellow Paladins. She, like many other scientists, had an artist’s mind. Just look at Da Vinci. As it turned out, the aliens also liked having the metalwork there. They had made perches out of them, as if they were their friends too. It was sweet really.  
The next stop had been the Onilu mall. Matt had asked Pidge to show him something that “just looks like it’s out of a bad sifi movie”. And so they did. What stuck out the most amongst all the bizarre shops was the Earth store. It was just...weird. Earth stuff, all the way out here. Where did the aliens even get it? Then they told him about how they had gotten Kaltenecker there and he just looked even more confused. Maybe all those stories of people’s cows being abducted were true. But was there really a market for Earth livestock? Had there ever been?  
Their fun was interrupted after about a varga when Farkon found them. He was angry about the “space pirates” being there, less angry about the Voltron team and a rebel fighter being there. He chased them out of his jurisdiction, less dramatic this time.  
What was probably Matt’s favorite stop was visiting the Olkari. He was absolutely taken aback at the people’s technology. Even more so when Pidge herself could craft robots with her mind with the help of the headband. His excitement accelerated one-step further when he tried it and . Practically fainting as a reaction Pidge had had to catch him. Pidge later explained that the green lion could do something similar and he demanded for her to show him. The whole team had gone with them, but had split up. Pidge and Matt off to explore, and the rest to meet with leaders. Not for any diplomatic reasons, just to be friendly. The Olkari had become good friends of team Voltron.  
Next up was the Balmera. What a wonder it had become with the shimmering light blue crystals jutting up out of the browned rock. Hunk and Shay went off on and had what was basically a date! Much to Hunk’s dismay, the whole team made as many comments as possible. Even Keith made one or two. Coran later did come up to him and express his pride for Hunk.  
The Balmerans had begun to develop a more enriched culture that now included music. Their music was not quite fully formed. It was more like a form of chanting with a little more range in pitch paired with the banging of rocks for percussion. Hey, Rome wasn’t built in a day. It was just good for them to do something.  
On their way back, Hunk’s embarrassment didn’t stop. Lance was probably the worst, however, nothing could compare to Shiro’s dad talk.  
“So! What did you two do?” Lance asked raising an eyebrow as everyone exited their lions' hangar.  
“Nothing! Guys! Can you all stop!” Hunk yelled with a groan and trying to make his way into the lounge.   
“Yeah, Lance, what’s the point of being in space if we can’t go around dating whatever aliens we want?” Pidge questioned as she and the rest followed him. Matt lightly elbowed her for the comment. He would date all the aliens if he could, mostly Allura, but Shiro was still an option that he was very much a fan of. Very, very much a fan of…  
“Pidge! There’s nothing wrong with me hanging out with Shay,” Hunk protested as he sat down on the couch. The other part of her comment settled in, “And we are not dating!”  
“Someone better tell her that,” Keith perked up and leaning against the wall.  
“You know what I think,” Shiro asked as he sat down next to Hunk and put his metallic arm around his shoulder, “I think that it’s sweet that Hunk has a girlfriend, and even better for him to want to visit. But, you know Hunk, if you keep visiting, I may have to set a curfew.”  
“Shiro!” Hunk threw his face into his waiting hands.  
“Don’t worry, buddy, good ol’ Lancey Lance is here to help you with all of your lady troubles.”  
“I don’t want your help, Lance, no offence man, but it kinda sucks." He thought for a moment and smirked. "You know, Matt’s might be better..."  
“Hey!” Lance protested slamming his hands down on the couch he was seated on. “Pidge that settles it! We’re dumping your brother back on whatever rock you found him on.” Matt roared with laughter.  
Allura and Coran walked in through the door chuckling at the sight.  
“Well, that was most certainly a very successful visit,” Allura said as she joined the paladins.  
“Indeed! Always good to improve moral for the liberated planets!” Coran confirmed tugging on his shirt in a proud manner. He cleared his throat and said, “Ah, so Hunk, how was the...ah…hanging out, as you called it?”  
“Thank you, Coran, it went well.”  
“Good, good. Now, anywhere else we want to take Matt?”  
“I can’t think of any... Lance?”  
“Mermaid world!”  
“Mermaid world?” Matt questioned crossing his arms and raising his eyebrows.  
“Lance and I went to a mermaid alien type world,” Hunk explained.  
“Really, how does that work in space? Is it like Europa?”  
“Kinda? I don’t even know its aliens.”  
“You sound like the internet!”  
“You want to visit?”  
“Sure,” Matt laughed.  
The biggest question they had after the thought was, wait, do we have enough suits? Turns out, they did. In storage, in the back of the castle. They had a light coating of dust. The paladins, of course, had their armor, but Matt, and Coran did not. Coran’s spare space suit would work, but it had laid in storage for 10,000 years. It needed some repairs, and Matt needed a completely new ones. He did not have one to begin with; the Galra took it his Earth one he had been abducted in. An Altean spare would work just as well if not better.  
They sent a signal to the world of water as the pointed their ship to it letting them know that they were coming. Hunk had explained to the crew that the merpeople had a giant clam that sent out a radio signal that Allura had used to find the pair when they had been dumped during the weird wormhole jump.  
Shiro and Keith, for obvious reasons, did not want to return to the planet where they had landed.  
Soon, the mighty The Castle of the Lions landed on the half melted ice. True to her word, queen Luxia had allowed the thermal vents to warm up the ocean and melt the ice on the surface. The was still some in large glacier forms, like the one they had landed the castle ship.  
Mermaids and men surfaced in greeting to welcome the paladins. Most notably, Plaxum, Blumpfump, Swirn and the queen herself. Pilots of magic robot space lions being a big deal, who could have guessed.  
After everyone adorned their space suits and dove beneath to join the merpeople and introduce themselves to those whom they had not yet met.  
After exchanging some looks with various merpeople, guys and gals alike, Lance settled down a little and chatted with Plaxum. She seemed a little less enthused to see him as he her, but was still polite about it, something Lance really could take note from. But, eh, a guy could still dream right?  
Matt, was practically having the time of his life. It was like the exploration of the castle all over again. His best reaction was shared between him and Pidge as they got their bubbles. Pidge claimed that it defied the laws of nature; Matt said that it did not make sense, where was all that co2 going? And how did they not over heat while wearing them?  
The gang enjoyed good food, music, dance, although a much less hypnotic version from what Lance and Hunk had seen, and to top it all off, Lance’s favorite, an underwater parade. Everything he could have hoped for and more. It was mermaids man! Mermaids! How could he not feel like the most important being in the universe right at that moment?  
After spending the night on the planet, probably one of the best nights of sleep they would get for a while, the gang departed in their castle ship. Soon after departing, they began to pick up an odd signal. It was a distress call for sure, but it was at least twenty years old. Whoever had sent out that call was long gone by now. Dead, or disposed of by some other means. Still, they had to do something about it, so in a wormhole they went.  
As soon as they exited the swirling vortex, bizarre energy ratings began spiking on every sensor. Not even Coran could pick out what exactly it was, or even where it was coming from. His best guess was the clouds of strange gasses that swirled outside the windows.  
Mists of gold, red, aqua, purple, with neon green drifted past. Black, gold, and silver specs adorned the endless storm outside the safety of the ship. Seemingly peaceful at one moment and then angry the next, it would crash against itself with some kind of internal anger. The nebula was huge, it enveloped the ship in its colorful clutches and caressed the walls. It reminded Lance of when his younger siblings would paint with watercolors.  
“Coran? What is this stuff,” Keith asked seeing another wave hit the castle wall, threatening the window of sight.  
“I’m not sure. I’ve never seen readings like this,” Coran said with a pensive look toward the translucent blue screens.  
“Are they coming from the ship?” Matt asked turning to Coran.  
“They may be… What was on that ship?” He mused scrolling through different energy signatures and fraunhofer lines for one that matched what they were seeing.  
“About that, It appears that we are losing the signal,” Allura said typing faster to try to regain access.  
“What, How! We got closer, how did we lose it?” Pidge asked scanning up and down the plumes that surrounded them for some sign of something outside.  
“I don’t know, it appears that this gas is messing with our sensors.”  
“Should we go out and look around in our lions?” Shiro asked uncrossing his arms.  
“I… I don’t know,” Allura admitted, “Coran what do you think we should-“  
Bang!  
The crew screamed as something rammed into the castle with enough force to throw everyone off his or her feet.  
“What was that?” Keith yelled from the floor.  
“Checking scanners now!”  
The screen in the front of central command expanded to show the missing ship careening into them.  
“Speak of the devil,” Pidge remarked as Matt helped her stand back up.  
“And the devil shall come,” he finished with a wink.  
“Coran, can you scan for life forms on the ship?” asked Shiro.  
“Yes, just a tick,” he proceeded to type as fast as he could possibly, “Scanners indicate one life form aboard, but it is possible that it could be just a robot, or the ship’s computer. I can't seem to find where it is coming from. The strange energy appears to be causing the castle’s systems to malfunction.”  
“A robot?” Matt and Pidge asked in unison. The team ignored the pair.  
“We need to get over there now. Team, get to your lions,” Shiro commanded. It had now become habit to have Matt tag along on missions as Green’s copilot in case of an emergency or if cloaking was needed. Matt could not be more thrilled when the team had first explained the idea. Just riding back with Pidge that first time was thrill enough to last him a year.  
Everyone ran to their chutes and jumped in grabbing their color coordinated zip line.  
On their way down, Hunk spoke up, “Guys, what do you think happened to that ship?”  
“My best guess is that it caught in that weird energy and lost its way,” Matt wandered his cape flowing behind him hitting Pidge in the face due to the angle the speed down on.  
“Matt, get rid of that cloak, I’m tired of it hitting me and it looks hideous,” Pidge protested.  
The pair plopped into their seats and took off in almost perfect time as the others.  
Everyone got in their lions and pressed the startup buttons, which were surprisingly not in the same place on every lion. Nice planning king Alfor. Wait, how the aliens even know what lions were?  
“Hey, Blue, how’s it going, girl? Ready to go look at a creepy abandoned ship?” Lance spoke to his lion who in turn made a sound not unlike a cat’s purring.  
The lion and their pilots departed from their hangar. And out into space. Into the storm of color that surrounded them.  
“Uhh, anyone else getting creeped out here?” Hunk asked.  
“I’m sure it’s nothing, at most, some radioactivity,” Pidge replied pushing forward and landing on the top of the alien ship, “Allura, what planet is this ship from?”  
“I can’t be sure, something from when Coran and I were in cryosleep,” She replied, look for some kind of air lock or entrance.”  
“Will do, princess,” Shiro replied exiting his lion and setting his feet onto the craft’s hull. The rest followed suit except Matt. He was backup. But they wouldn’t need that for an abandoned ship right?  
“I swear if it’s another trans-reality comet,” Lance commented with a sound that was a cross between a growl and a groan.  
“Trans-reality comet?” Matt asked over comms.  
“I did say that we’d been to another reality…” Pidge said.  
“Ugh! And I wasn’t invited!”  
Pidge laughed, “See you in a bit.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to everyone who left Kudos! It means a lot to know that people are reading and, more importantly. are liking what they are.  
> Lance speaks a sentence of Spanish in this chapter. However, I do not speak nor take Spanish as a class, I take German, so please let me know if it is wrong or if there is a better phrase that would work in place, because I just used Google Translate like a dork.  
> And another big thank you to Eboni for the support/help and lovely comment on chapter one.  
> Thanks again,  
> You_Quiznacking_Quiznack

With a little difficulty, mostly derived from the fact that no one there could read the alien language, the paladins found the air lock and entered the craft.

The five pilots gazed into the inky black that filled the ship. 

“So who wants to go first?” Keith asked.

“I nominate you, or Shiro, you both seem to have a death wish,” Lance joked elbowing him and adding a smirk for good measure.

“Lance,” Shiro said sighing.

“Ok, then Pidge go; you’re the smallest and the least noticeable.”

“Hey!” 

“Hay is for horses!”

“Focus, guys,” Shiro said drifting into the ship.

“See! He’s going first! Death wish!” 

“Lance, not the time,” Keith said with a shiver, “Is it cold to anyone else?” 

“It’s space, it’s cold.”

Keith sighed in resignation. Space may be cold, but it felt unnaturally so. It felt like he had stopped producing heat to him. Like everything was ice.

“Maybe a little,” Shiro answered with a shrug. He winced at the motion.

“What wrong?” Hunk asked moving over to him.

“My back just hurts is all. It’s nothing,” he replied moving away slightly.

“Mine too,” Pidge said trying to rub hers, “Let’s just get inside this thing and see what happened.”

Hunk nodded as they all soared into the abandoned ship. 

Inside, there was not much left; it looked like a fire was what had happed. Scorch marks pained the walls black. Soot and ash partials danced through the air preforming some macabre dance. In the zero G, exposed burnt wires slid their fingers out of the walls in clumps, their internal strands looking like tentacles. 

“Let’s go find the control room,” Shiro said moving faster, “See if the gravity still works in there.”

The group moved down the halls lighting the way with their wrist lights. As they walked along there was graffiti type markings all over the walls the closer they got to the center. There were smudges of what looked like purple or yellow fluids staining the once clean walls. Probably what was left from chemicals spills that caused the fire in the first place.

“Did, did the people here go insane? What caused the fire?” Keith asked.

“I’m not sure, let’s keep looking for that gravity switch,” Shiro said, “We can’t be far now.”

Soon, the five reached the center room of the abandoned craft. Shiro used his robotic arm to pry open the doors with little effort. The old and broken tech gave way soon enough.

As they entered through the doors and swept the room with their lights, they saw that it appeared to have been saved from the outside destruction. Futuristic computers lined the circular hub save for the space where another door was shut tight. Switches and dials were arranged in rows on the walls with small labels and lights that once used to be lit. There was what looked like a server farm going into one of the walls that could slide out if needed. A central command center lay in the middle of the room with screens and a large wheel that was probably for manually steering the ship. 

“Everyone split up and look for gravity and lights. See if either still work. While you’re at it, look to see if there is some kind of log that might say what happened,” Shiro said maneuvering over to a wall. “Matt, can you still hear us?”

“Loud and clear, what’s up?”

“It looks like there was some kind of fire here. We’re looking to see if there is any power left in the ship for gravity or lights. It doesn’t look like there is anyone else here.”

“Roger that. Keep looking. Can one of you do a scan for biorhythms?”

“Sure, I’ll get right on that. Thanks for the help,” Shiro said cutting off his radio off for the time being. “Lance, can you do a bio-scan? Matt wants us to be sure that there is no one else here.”

“Fine,” he grumbled. He still was not sure how he felt about Matt. It felt like he was taking his place in the team. Only smarter. It wasn’t fair, he was smart too, just not a genius like him.

Lance tapped several buttons on his wrist screen and activated the scan through his helmet. There was a beeping at first until he turned and saw that the scanner was only picking up his fellow paladins. He made a complete 360 of the room, surveying the ship though the walls in the process.

“I’m not seeing anything, Shiro. You guys have any luck?”

“I’m not surprised; this place looks like it hasn’t had anyone here in years. I hope that whoever was on this ship evacuated in time. Still looking for that switch. You guys?”

“I think we can forget about that log, the servers look fried,” Hunk said pointing to them. “This place gives me the creeps.”

“Nothing, maybe it’s in another-“

“Found it!” Pidge interrupted Keith pulling down on a lever with the force of a mad scientist. Right on cue, sparks flared around the room as burnt circuits had power returned to them. The screen Hunk was next to shot out sparks as well before loose piece of glass fell out of it. Colored lights flickered to life and a whirring sound began as the paladins fell with the return of gravity.

“Oof!” Hunk said, “Little bit a warning next time, Pidge?”

“Sorry,” she shrugged with a smile.

Shiro hailed Matt, “Hey, found that gravity switch. No life forms on board and most of tech here looks burnt or is unusable. Everything ok out there?”

“Yeah, you guys ok?”

As if right on cue, Lance groaned standing up, “Oh man, my legs are killing me…” 

“I hear you, man. Mine too,” Matt replied. 

“My everything hurts,” Pidge complained, “Maybe it’s just training?”

“Probably,” Keith said, “My legs are hurt, but they don’t feel like their sore really.”

“Let’s get out of here. We know what happened; there is nothing here, no people, nothing we need. This clearly was not a trans-reality comet. Can we leave?” Hunk pleaded. 

“Shiro?”

Shiro thought for a moment, “Matt, do you pick up our biorhythms?”

“Yep, they look fine.”

“Then how did Coran and Allura find something?” 

“They did say that the weird stuff outside could be messing with the scanners,” Lance pointed out.

“Yeah… something just seems off,” Pidge said rubbing her neck with a wince. 

Noticing how the paladins were in pain and didn’t feel so good, Shiro made his decision, “Hunk’s right, we should get back. None of us are in good enough shape for this.” 

Keith nodded and crossed arms crossed, “But what do we do with the ship?”

“Ask Allura, but power it down for now. If we need anything else, we know how to find this room.”

“Good,” said Hunk grabbing the lever and pulling down. The whirling stopped and a couple sparks flew as something short circuited. As gravity left, everyone floated up. Lance would never stop loving that feeling. It was like swimming but even better. There was this kind of thrill, that drop in the pit of your stomach, that Lance loved. This kind of unnatural, but fun feeling. Better than any roller coaster on Earth.

The five retraced their steps out of the room, down the burnt to a crisp halls, past endless rooms with nothing but soot left, taking whatever twists and turns they had before. Everyone felt more secure once they reached their lions. Hunk actually sighed. 

“Hey, Pidge,” Matt said once she entered Green. 

“Hey,” she said pulling off her helmet, “You ok?” She looked at him with concern in her golden brown eyes. 

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?” Matt took out his radio as he spoke.

“You haven’t been training with us, there’s no reason for you to be sore, or in any kind of pain,” she explained as she steered the lion to its hangar. 

“I don’t know why either. I was thinking about that while you guys were gone.”

The castle opened the hatch to the large bay where the lions were stored and one by one everyone flew in. 

 

The team had changed from their armor into their regular clothes and were sitting in the lounge when they realized something was wrong. 

“Aaaaaauuuggggg!” Lance groaned, “Dose this place have alien pain killers because, my gosh! It hurts!”

“Hrrrrrrrrrrrrr, yeah, pain killers,” Hunk said grabbing his stomach.

“What’s wrong?” asked Coran sitting up.

“Nothing, we’re all just sore,” Keith said. A wave of pain rain up his spine and he winced and bit his lip. He tasted blood and held his hand to his mouth. He didn’t think he bit his lip that hard.  
“Keith? Are you alright?” Shiro asked putting his hand on his shoulder with a wince. 

“I bit my lip is all,” Keith explained showing him his blood. “I’m fine.”

“How hard did you bite it?” Lance yelled throwing his hands out toward him. 

“I didn’t!”

“Calm down, you two,” Shiro said breaking up the fight before it could manifest itself.

“We’re all just sore from training,” Keith countered

“Were not just sore. Matt wasn’t training and he hurts too,” Pidge chimed in.

Keith opened his mouth to respond but instead just began to shiver, “Quiznack, why is this place so cold?” He zipped up his jacket to add emphasis. 

“The temperature hasn’t changed,” Coran explained worriedly. 

Pidge stood up to go check on of the nearby thermostats. “Yep, you’re right… hasn’t, hasn’t,” she blinked slowly and began to sway, “mmmh,” she groaned softly and held her head in her hands. Matt walked over and placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Pidge? Are you alright?” Hunk asked running over forgetting his pain for Pidge’s own.

In response, she began to collapse. Matt caught her causing his legs to wobble. Everyone stood up from their seats if they hadn’t already.

“Pidge!” he yelled. She groaned louder until it turned into a scream. 

Shiro attempted to walk over but fell to the ground and began to breathe heavily, his heart ringing in his ears. 

“Shiro!” Keith ran over to him putting his arm on his back, making his breath catch. He made a strange almost strangled sound. Keith quickly removed his hand. 

“Coran, run and prepare healing pods!” Allura yelled crouching next to Shiro.

“On it, princess!”

“Pidge can you hear me?” Matt asked after laying Pidge down on the ground. She screamed again and squeezed tighter on her head. She grabbed at her ears raking her fingers down the sides of her head. Matt reached over to comfort her and to see what was wrong. He gasped. They were wrong, stretched out, and covered in something. Oh god! Was that fur!

Shiro roared in pain from his place on the ground making the air in the room tremble. Hunk felt it in his chest causing the pain he was feeling to worsen. What was happening to his friends?

“Shiro, Shiro, I’m here. What can I do-arrrgaughh!” Keith collapsed into the fetal position with Allura kneeling next to him scared and Shiro writhing in pain. 

Lance was next. He fell to the ground and grabbed his leg. 

“Ah, ah, ah, ahhhhhh aha ha oww ow ow ow,” Lance began to yell looking over at Hunk in pain and fear.

“Lance, what, what’s wrong?”

“It, ahh, it’s my legs!” Lance managed out, “Oh Dios mío, duele!”

Matt screamed and fell next to his sister. He hugged his sides pulling his legs close and forced them out as far as he could as fast as he could. He screamed louder and louder.

 

Things like bones and muscles could be seen shifting around under the surface of everyone skin, threatening to push their way out in some places. It was like their bodies were doing some sick puzzle. 

Allura didn’t know what was happening. Was this an Earth thing? She didn’t know much about humans or Earth in general. Only what Lane had told her about what he had missed. Did something happen on the other ship? How could she help them?

Bile rose in Hunk’s thought. His vision went blurry. He slowly dropped to his hands and knees panting. Allura made her way over to comfort him.

“No! Please, it hurts!” Tears formed in his eyes. Something ran down is spine shooting chills and numbness with it. He screamed loud and began to sob in the fetal position. Allura just sat down next to him crying with him out of fear and sympathy.

“I’m so sorry… I don’t know what to do…”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh boya! This was a long one. 12 pages when I typed in Microsoft Word and 14 in Google Drive to be exact. I must have gone through four different drafts for this part and combined half of the next chapter. This chapter is basically a collage of bits and pieces so here's hoping that it's readable.  
> Enjoy and thank you to everyone who left comments and kudos!  
> Until next time,  
> -You_Quiznacking_Quiznack

When Keith woke up, there was something wrong with his legs. 

It felt like someone had wrapped them up in plastic wrap and forced them together to the point that he could not discern one from the other. He tried to move one and couldn’t. They didn’t even budge. 

He swallowed hard and even that felt strange. His tongue felt, not heavy, but still strange, almost like it wasn’t the right shape, if that made sense. He couldn't place the problem. His vision seemed off, sharper around the edges, yet still fading in and out of focus. Was this how people felt without their glasses? He knew he was laying on his back, but he couldn’t tell where. The lights were too bright and hurt his eyes. He squeezed them shut and hoped that this would pass. 

Matt’s first thought was, what just happened? He had been in so much pain, so much pure agony. 

What had happened to everyone? Were they ok? Soon after he went down, he had blacked out so he had no idea about what had happened after. His fingers felt stuck. Like he was doing the Vulcan salute but he couldn’t get them to move. 

Like Keith, he too was laying down. However, he was on his side. He ovly saw the wall and a bit of a doorway. 

Pidge couldn’t feel anything. Well, correction, she couldn’t feel anything normal. Her entire physiology felt wrong. Like there was nothing left of her besides her brain that was working properly, and even that was still trying to unhook some kind of fogginess. 

Her back felt like there was some kind of added weight to it. Her hands, feet, and legs all felt bent into odd and bizarre new angles. Could she even move anymore? Was her body mangled beyond recognition? What would the other paladins think? What would Matt think? Could she ever do anything again? Could her body function, or was she just a brain trapped? Did she even have a body anymore?

No, no, she couldn’t be. She still had so much to do! She had to find her dad. She had to stop Zarkon and Lotor! She wasn’t done! Not yet!

Gathering all her strength she made an attempt to open her eyes. Nothing. No, no no NO! She was not ready to get up! Open open open! As she screamed in her head, there was a twitch. And another. With that little grain of hope, she forced them to open. However, all she could see was the floor, and part of the wall. And that little brown thing there, right in the center of her vision. Tipped in a wet black. 

Hunk felt like he had just been run over. Blinking his eyes open, he stared up at the celling of the castle. What had just happened to him? Groaning, Hunk lifted his heavy hands to his face and rubbed. Something felt wrong with his hands. Sure, they were always somewhat rough from working on projects for from stirring too hard with a spoon, but not like this. He pulled them away from his face in confusion for further examination.

Sure enough, his calluses had gotten worse. His nails looked longer sharper, and almost black like claws. Even more confused, and a little scared, he turned them over. Dark brown almost black hair covered the backs of his palms and up his arms. No, not hair, fur. Thick and shaggy. He felt like he was going to scream, faint, and throw up all at the same time. 

Lance just felt heavy. Incredibly, increasingly so. Like he had gained weight and it was pulling him down. He remembered the pain of before and closed his eyes. Where was everyone? 

He also felt long or at least that he was taking up too much space. But why? And why had they all been in such unbearable pain? 

He raised his head making his first moves to sitting up. As he did so, he felt his ears lift up after his head did. Wait, what? As he began to shift his weight, he heard and felt his spine crack in several different places. He winced and his ears went up. He froze. He couldn’t move his ears. Hunk always could, and a couple of his siblings too, but never him, no matter how much he tried. Weird, he thought, maybe it was being is space, or the magic wormholes, or anything really.

Slowly, he moved his arm up to his ear. And felt something long, fuzzy, and warm. Ok, definitely not normal.

Shiro’s vision swam. He wasn’t sure if he was laying down, sitting, standing, walking, or floating. From his vantage point, he could tell that he was much higher off the ground than he would be if he were just laying down or sitting. Or was he? 

Something was blocking his vison. No, not blocking, in his line of sight. It was long, and wide with a dark grey to black coloration. It was right where his nose should be. 

Maybe Lance or Pidge and Matt had put something there. Maybe someone had spilt something on him of that color, and in his blocked state of mind, his nose just looked big. To see what it was, Shiro lifted his heavy and limp feeling hand to his face. Once it entered his line of sight, he screamed. Except, it was not a scream, it was a strangled sound. It bearded a close similarity to a roar of some kind. And that was what scared him most.

Coran and Allura looked up from their data pads with a gasp and locked eyes. Without a word, they threw down the tablets and ran in its direction. 

At the sound, the other five were more awake. Keith snapped up. Forget not being able to move his legs, the rush of adrenaline was enough for him to regain his strength. Same for everyone else. 

Allura and Coran arrived and looked to everyone when they entered with a somber look. 

“I am sorry, paladins. For, we are afraid something has happened to you,” Allura said shaking her head.

“Wh-what d-do you m-m-mean?” Lance stuttered, his ears shifting up causing him to freeze. He was not a fan of that. 

“It’s better for you to see for yourself,” Coran said walking over to Shiro with Allura.  
Shiro swallowed hard afraid what he would find. From what his hand had looked like, he had every reason to fear. It had been black, and scaly, with claws on his fingers. They didn’t look at all like hands actually. They did not look human at all. 

“Shiro, can you stand?” Coran asked placing his hand on him. On his back? It didn’t feel like his back. It felt too far away but still, it was there. 

“I think. Is there something wrong with me?” Shiro jumped back slightly. All that had come out was some growling and incoherent sounds. 

Allura gave him a blank look, “I can’t understand, Shiro.” 

Shiro looked himself up and down. Absolutely nothing remained of his old self. He tried to get to his two feet but fell down onto four. It felt surprisingly natural. His robotic arm had somehow changed too. It still had the silver color and texture, but its shape had drastically been altered to look like the leg of a reptile. In fact, wasn’t even his arm, it was his leg now. 

He twisted his head around past his shoulders down the length of his back. He saw a lot that freaked him out, but above all were the two new appendages that protruded out. They looked like another set of arms with overly long fingers. That was when he realized that they were wings. He extended one using a part of his brain that he didn’t know was there. They were black with a thumb type structure at the top of them. Grey membrane grew between his “fingers”. He turned along his body like a dog chasing its tail to get a better look at the things. Ironically, in doing this, he saw his own large sweeping tail. It too, like the majority of his scales, was black with the occasional scale of varying grey thrown in. His tail was tipped with a series of white and silver spikes that looked deadly. He did not appreciate the height change that came with the changes. And the four legs thing did not sit well. His vision was off from his new height adjustment. He was now taller than Allura, who was standing next to him trying to calm him down, by almost an entire head length. Speaking of, he now had two long heavy, curved horns adorning the sides of his head. They looked twisted from the sides. They could probably take an eye out if he swung his head the wrong way. Horns did not sit well with Shiro. Four legs did not sit well with Shiro. Wings sure as heck did not sit well Shiro. Actually, nothing about being a quiznacking dragon sat well with Shiro. 

Lance snapped his head over to Shiro and screamed. Then he looked over to the others and screamed louder. Slowly, he turned his head to his own body and began to freak out. Lance screamed in Spanish kicking his four new horse legs. His back, that his was still laying on, had become elongated dragging his legs along with it. He would have been incredibly disproportionate if not for the two other legs that had formed below his waist where his others had been. They weren’t really his legs either. They were skinny, and ended with dark brown hooves. His lower half was covered in a think, yet soft, dark khaki brown colored coat of fur. There were some lighter, almost white patches on his flanks and on the lower half of his legs. His upper half seemed untouched aside from his ears being that of a horse as well. 

“C-centaur…” Hunk managed out pointing at him. 

Hunk’s changes had been relatively kind. Well, depends how you see it. He guts had all been rearranged and twisted when his body’s proportions were altered to make it look parts of him were too long or too short. For example, his back had become hunched over and slightly bent while his arms, which were stockier and more muscular, extended nearly to his knees. He inspected the fur he had found earlier on his hands and rubbed his face. Once he felt something hard, he stopped. He grabbed one and pulled on it. It was coming out of his mouth next to his canines. It was a tusk he realized, long, hard and curved. They gave him an underbite revealing sharper teeth inside. He grabbed at his hair freaking out. Again, he hit something hard and sharp. Horns, small and poking up out of his dark locks. His feet looked to have been given the same treatment as his hands and now had fun and claw like nails. 

Suppressing his sickness, he stood up to go help Lance and as he did so, something wacked into his leg. Looking down to investigate, he found a furry short, stocky tail. It looked like a lizard’s with patches of that same fur. It had small hocked, almost unnoticeable, spines. There was a larger tuft for the fur at the end like a lion tail. What was he? 

Hunk sat down next to Lance and began to talk to him hoping that his friend would be able to recognize him. 

Keith watched Shiro discovered what he’d become and Lance freaked out with Hunk trying to calm him. What had happened to him then? He looked down at his hands. There were small red scales peppering them and gathering in patches in uneven places on his arms. They poked out from under his black gloves, the sleves of his shirt, everywhere he looked. Inside the red were a few iridescent golden scales mixed with oranges and purples. There were now claws on the end of his fingers. How far up did they go? Were they on his back? He swallowed bringing them up to his face with closed eyes. Over the top of his head, along his face, down the back of his neck. The only thing he found were ears that were much more pointed and more patches of scales. 

What did the rest of him look like? If his top half seemed unscathed, then what happened to the lower? Lance’s bottom half looked like a wreck compared to what it used to be. Bracing himself he looked down. No wonder he had felt like his legs were wrapped up, they were. Not really but oh my god he was going to be sick. Waist down, he was a snake. His legs had fused into one long muscular appendage. It was scarlet with gold specks like the patches on his hands and arms. On his underbelly, well, his front really, larger scales, plate like in appearance ran to the tip of his tail. They were not the same rich scarlet color as his others, but a paler color more akin to a deep watermelon shade. Leaning his weight against his hands, he scurried back trying to move away from the thing attached to him. It slithered and made and S shaped movements along with him. He backed into a wall and rubbed his head. 

He opened his mouth and pushed his thumb into his teeth. It hurt more than it should have. His teeth had become much more sharp with his canines having transformed into curved long fangs. He removed his hand, ran his tongue along them, and froze. What was wrong with his tongue? Again he lifted hand to his mouth and grabbed his tongue. It was longer and much skinnier now. That wasn’t the weirdest part. That part was the fact that, like an actual snake, was forked. 

The initial shock had given way to something else now. Cold. He was freezing. Unbearably so. He brought the thing he had tried to get away from close to his chest in hopes to conserve body heat. It wasn’t working. He could not hold his heat. Curled up like that his shivers began to get less violent and not so close together. He slowed down simply. Tired, he thought, I’m just so tired, and passed out. Seeing this, Coran rushed over to him yelling his name.

Matt was stunned into silence from the horror of everyone’s state. However, two thoughts struck his mind, the first being what just happened? and the second being, where's Pidge? The first thing he did was look to his hands. Good indicator, he thought, after seeing everyone else do it. He wasn’t really thinking clearly, no one there was. Well maybe the Alteans, but they hadn’t just transformed into monsters. 

Matt held his hands up and shook his head at what he saw. His index and middle fingers had fused to form one. This left him, including the thumb, with only four fingers per hand. They were tipped in a hard dark brown colored substance. A light brown colored fur covered the backs of his hands and ran down his fingers to about the second joint from the tip. The color was very similar to the hair on his head. He pulled up his sleeve just to see how far it went. The fur tapered out once it reached the middle of his forearm but large patches congregated on his elbows hanging down forming a triangular shape. In shaking his head, he found two odd things. The first was when something soft and floppy hit in face. It snapped back into place on the side of his head. That was his ear he realized. His now animal ear. The second thing or rather things he noticed were the two added weights that were just above his ears. Oh, god, he thought, please let that not be what I think it is. He grabbed it and tried to pull on it. The only thing that did was bring his head along with it. He couldn’t see it, but as he grabbed it up and down and felt individual spikes, he soon put two and two together. He had antlers. That sickening feeling grew heavier and heavier the more it sunk in. 

Bracing himself, he looked to where had hurt the most before, his legs. They concealed by his pants, he swallowed and pulled up the fabric. They too were covered in that thick brown fur. His bones and bent and slid into new positions making the joins all wrong for a human, but right for a deer. Right for a satyr or faun. He removed his boots to see that he now had hooves the same color as the material on his hands. Safe to assume that the material was also hoof like in origin. Up to about where his ankle would be, cream colored fur spread mixing with the soft browns that made up the rest of his fur. On the sides of his legs, there were much lighter patches of the same color as the strips of cream almost like a faun's spots.

"Nope. Oh no no no. I'm a deer. Oh god."

He he bit back what felt like rising bile and worked on standing up next. He still had two legs walking should still be the same right? Unlike Lance or Keith who had to figure out how to maneuver. At least Hunk was trying to help get Lance up. Sliding one leg under himself, Matt pushed up. He slid and fell down. His hooves were just too slick for the tiled floor. It was like standing up in roller-skates! He tried again. This time, he fell on his face. He groaned and pushed himself into a sitting position. As he did so, his ears flicked and something else did too. He whipped around, antlers causing more momentum than he accounted for and hesitantly moved away his cloak to see that he had a short, stubby tail about the size of a hand poking out of a hole in his pants. It was brown on top and creamy while on the bottom. A strip of black cut between the two colors.

“Ohmygod I have a tail!” His shouts were lost in the chaos of the situation. 

Shiro was looking into Allura’s eyes trying to communicate something that he just couldn’t say. At least Matt thought it was Shiro. It was a freaking dragon after all. It had Shiro’s signature white streak but just in scales, and a robotic ligament. It was probably Shiro, right? Lance and Hunk were working on helping Lance to stand up. They weren’t making much progress. Like Matt, his hooves could not get a grip on the slick flooring. Keith had passed out curled up against himself, wrapped in red coils with Coran nearby. But they’re all doing that, then, then where is Pidge? He thought his ears and tail twitching more. Oh, he did not like that feeling. He did not like that feeling at all. 

He made his way to stand up again. This time he did stand. Just like roller-skating, he thought getting a queasy feeling. He pivoted in place trying to, not only see himself, but to find his sister. There was something on the floor almost directly next to him. It was tan brown color and looked to have wrapped itself in something egg shelled colored. It made a whimpering sound and wrapped the things wrapped tighter. 

“K-Katie?” 

She had been, not hiding, but hunkering down to avoid her friends. Pidge had seen what had happened to parts of herself and did not want to see the rest. She had looked down to her hands and seen hooves instead. Black in color and hard and small. They were split like any other deer’s with a sharp point at the end. Fur the color of her hair had sprung up all over her skin. She could see that her face had been extended into some kind of muzzle. Her nose was black and wet like a dog’s. Judging from the lack of thin circular lines cutting through her vision, she had lost her glasses somewhere. She reached up her hooves trying to grab it but couldn’t. They slid down her face over and over as she began to panic. 

“No, no, no, no, no, no!” Pidge said but all that came out was some bizarre bleating.

She pushed herself down to the ground and tried to disappear. As she did so, something light and soft wrapped around her. She snapped open her eyes and looked to see what it was. All she saw was something eggshell off-white in front of her. It had feathers tipped in varying shades green. It was a wing. She reached out her new shiny hoof and poked it. She felt the poke in both her hoof and in her…wing… People weren’t supposed to have wings. Or hooves. Or anything that she now had.

She flopped herself down again and made a small whimpering sound. 

That was when Matt spoke up. Pidge made that sound again. There was a clicking sound. Followed by the sound of her brother falling onto his furry butt. 

“Owwwwwww,” he groaned. Pidge whipped her head around to Matt moving his hooves trying to turn himself around. 

“Matt!” Pidge tried to yell; only bleating came out. She took note of the two patches of speckled brown fur just under his eyes, the shiny, wet, black nose, and the pronged antlers, the fluffy and soft looking ears. 

“Pidge, you’re gonna be ok,” He put his four fingered hand on, what he assumed, was her shoulder careful to avoid disturbing the feathers that lay there. 

“What happened?” she asked extending a hoof pointing to his... well everything.

“Pidge, I don’t understand, what are you saying?” He shook his head slightly. 

“Why are we deer? Where is everyone else? Are they deer too? Why do I have wings? Why am I a full on deer when you’re only half?” 

“Pidge! I don’t know what you’re saying.” He wrapped his entire arm around her. “Everyone’s like this.” 

Matt waved his hand around the room. Pidge sat back with her mouth slightly agape taking in the sight of what was happening. She swiveled her head back to Matt who gave her a halfhearted smile. 

“Heh, I guess you could say that this is a monster of a situation,” he tried to joke.

“Matt…” 

“Still don’t know what you’re saying. Oh deer huh?” Pidge did the best glare a deer could including her ears flattening.

“Come on; let’s see if you can stand. Where are your glasses?”

“I don’t know,” she said turning her head to find them and gaping at her new changes at the same time. “There.” She pointed her hoof to where they had slid about two feet away. 

Matt leaned over grabbing them and sliding them onto her face. “There,” he smiled. They fell slightly askew to the left warranting a slight laugh from Pidge.

Matt stood up wobbly. He wound up bracing himself on Pidge’s head by accident to which he apologized profusely. Once standing, he extended a hand to his sister. Only after doing so did he realize that it wouldn’t help her one bit. He removed his hand while Pidge worked on shifting weight into her back legs and slowly began to move them into a standing position. Doing this, she discovered that, instead of a deer tail, she tail feathers the same coloration as her wings. There were two much longer feathers that reminded her of peacock ones. Once she got all of her weight under her and supported, she began to slip and fall. Matt caught her for the second time that day. 

“Hooves, huh?” Matt said trying to make her feel better. Pidge just shook her head. 

He helped her fully stand and not fall this time. If she was already a short person to begin with, then this was just humiliating! Now she stood slightly taller than where her elbows once were. If people had needed to lower their head to her before then, oh boy, she did not like this one bit. Sure people could be jerks about a height difference sometimes, even her friends, but she had gotten used to it and it really stopped phasing her. But this, this, was just nuts! It did not help that she was a full on animal!

She was a deer. With wings. In space. In a castle. That was a space ship. Who pilots a giant green robot lion. With a satyr faun thing for a brother. And a dragon, a troll, a naga, and a centaur as teammates. 

This was not happening. 

“Pidge? Think you can walk?” Matt asked pulling her out of her thoughts. 

She nodded putting her right hoof forward then the left. It then occurred to her that she didn’t know how to walk with four legs. Just like crawling right? She asked herself scooting her back legs up in the same fashion. Repeating the same movements, she got the hang of it somewhat. Her hooves slid and scrapped at the ground for their bearing as she kept walked. 

“Good job,” Matt said slipping as well. He looked around with a sick feeling. Shiro and Allura had moved over the Keith and Coran. Lance had managed to stand with the help of Hunk. “Let’s go help Lance. He looks like he’s having some trouble with his hooves.”

 

Lance swore as his hooves gave out from under him and he slammed his pelvis into the floor leaving his tail in the air. 

“This has got to be a dream,” he begged groaning and pushing up with his arms while Hunk did his best to support him. 

Hunk nodded and said, “I hope it is.”

Lance lifted a hoof and placed it in front of him. His other legs wobbled in retaliation to the consequential added weight. He hesitantly lifted a back hoof and did the same. Then with the other front hoof. This time it hit the ground on an angle causing him to slip. Hunk caught his shoulders so he didn’t make it all the way down.

“Thanks, buddy,” Lance said extending his legs again. 

“No problem.”

At this point, Matt and Pidge had made their way over to the pair.

“Hooves giving you trouble?” Matt asked weakly shuffling his own making him slip and brace his weight on Pidge again. “Sorry.”

“Loads,” he said lifting a hoof again making the same steps. 

“Is, is that Pidge?” Hunk asked pointing.

She nodded with a weak smile, “In the flesh?”

“And Shiro is a dragon,” Matt said, “It doesn’t seem like either can talk.”

“So, Mr. Deer-man, think you can help with these stupid thigs?”

“As much as I can. We got you if you fall. Don’t worry, hooves suck on this flooring.” 

“Very helpful,” Lance remarked with a glare and his ears twitching. He shuddered. God, that is weird, he thought

“Hey, I fell too,” Pidge said.

“Again, no idea what you’re saying. But both Pidge and I fell too.”

Pidge huffed in annoyance of Matt repeating her.

“Good for you.” Lance kept moving his hooves.

“I did, right on my tail.”

“You have a tail?” Hunk asked. 

“Yep. Very fluffy,” he smirked trying to make Lance feel better.

“Really? Let me see!”

Matt turned around and pulled his jacket out of the way for Hunk to see. He did his best to flick it for good measure, however, he had no idea if he actually did giving his lack of control of his new limb. 

Hunk laughed, “It is!”

“Whatever,” Lance said putting another hoof forward. “How is this supposed to help me?”

“It already did, see? You’re walking.”

Sure enough, Lance was, Matt had tricked him into doing it. He had been thinking about it too hard. 

“He’s right, Lance, I already let go a while ago,” Hunk said.

Great, now he’s better at walking then me too, Lance thought. Better at turning into a freak, better at acting normal. Just better. It’s like he never even has to try with this kind of stuff. Why does he have to be like this? 

With as much success as Lance, Matt, Hunk, and Pidge were having, Coran, Keith, Allura, and Shiro weren’t having any. 

“Paladins!” Coran yelled, “Keith passed out, what do I do?” He was kneeling next to him holding his hand feeling his pulse. 

Without knowing what he was doing, Shiro ran over to Keith and flopped down. He placed one of his massive paw like feet on his chest. He removed it seeing how big it was. The other thing he noticed was just how cold he was. That wasn’t good for reptiles right?

He looked to Allura who had ran over with him and tried to explained what was wrong. Keith was frigid! Even if he weren’t a snake, no one should be that temperature.

“He’s too cold!” 

“Shiro, we don’t know what you’re saying,” Allura explained placing her hand on his shoulder and shook it lightly. 

Shiro tapped the ground and tried to write out the word cold. 

“We can’t read human.” 

Shiro swept his head around the room for help to see the four other Earthlings making their way over. Hunk was helping to support Lance Matt and Pidge on the slick floor, actually, they were all supporting each other the best they could. Shiro would have been glad to see the teamwork if they were not in the current circumstances. 

Shiro roared for them to move faster making a ‘come on’ hand movement. 

Matt broke off running over seeing what the problem was with Lance Pidge, and Hunk in toe. Shiro quickly spelled out the word again. 

“Are you spelling something?” he asked kneeling down next to Keith.

Shiro nodded vigorously glad to see that someone at least got the gist. He dragged his talon on the floor again spelling out the word.

“C-O-L-D? Cold. He’s cold?”

Shiro’s eyes widened and he nodded. He spelled out another word.

“S-N-A-K-E, snake! Keith is a snake! Yes, that makes sense! Shiro! You’re right! Coran, Allura, we need to find some way to heat Keith up. Snakes are reptiles, they’re cold blooded; if they get too cold then they’ll fall asleep or become lethargic.”

“Oh no! Allura! Go and get Keith blankets!” Coran yelled running to a thermostat and cranking up the heat. Allura ran off with a nod. 

“How do we heat him up until then?” Matt asked sitting down next to Keith. 

“Body heat,” Hunk said sitting down as well with Lance and Pidge, “Or friction. It’s our best option without a heat lamp and until Allura finds those blankets.” 

Matt began to rub Keith’s arms taking note of just how cold he had become. Shiro however took the body heat as not a suggestion, but a command. He hunkered down and wrapped one of his massive wings around him pulling him away from Matt. Keith curled himself against Shiro’s body and started to hug him out of instinct. Shiro looked almost surprised and lifted up his wing to see what he was doing giving everyone a view. Keith whimpered in protest and hugged tighter making Shiro lower his wing again. 

Allura came running back with a large stack of comforters in her hands about a dobash later. Shiro lifted his wing to allow her to spread them out. 

Keith began to groan and sit up rubbing his head. He looked around and shot up the rest of the way once he saw the rest of the team. He still was leaning up against Shiro instinctively for heat. 

“Morning, Keith. Got your beauty sleep?” Lance halfheartedly joked.

“Sleep?” Keith looked down at the blankets, froze slightly and slowly removed them. He cringed at the red tail that was still there. He looked up at everyone else swallowing dryly.

Seeing that Keith was awake, Shiro stood up. Keith jumped and fell backwards. Shiro leaned over him with what was supposed to be a smile. 

“Snakes get cold, they sleep. Shiro helped us with that,” Matt explained as Hunk helped Keith into a sitting position. 

Keith nodded in response, “Thanks.” 

“Are you feeling better? Still cold?” Coran asked.

“No, I’ll be fine,” Keith lied. He was still chilly but much less now. Quiznack, he was a reptile now. He was cold blooded. God, this was just too weird. To weird, to weird, to weird.

“Are you sure?”

“I said I’m fine.”

“Do you need help standing?” Allura asked.

“I’m fine,” Keith said grabbing on to Shiro’s side and pulling up. His muscles now moved in a very strange and new way. It felt like every movement his tail made was like holding a plank for too long, like his core was strained. He did his best to get to what was about his average height but it was difficult to gauge.

“So what do you think’s happened to us?” Lance dared no longer clinging to Hunk’s support, “It’s not an Earth thing.”

“We are not quite sure,” explained Allura, “It appears that you all have transformed.”

“Which may be due to the strange energy readings,” Coran cut in seeing the paladins’ frustration in that statement, “With further review of the signatures, it bears a very strong resemblance to pure quintessence.”

“Wh-wh-what does that mean for us? Can we just go and and I don’t know, change back?” Hunk said grabbing at his short tail.

“We tried, I’m sorry. We flew the ship back through the storm, but nothing happened,” Allura explained. Shiro had a look of fear in his eyes and tried to speak again but all it came out was frantic growls and grumbles.

“Then how do we reverse it?” Matt asked.

“We’re not sure,” Allura said.

“I’ll show you the data that we have, but it’s not much.”  
“But what about Shiro and Pidge? They can’t even talk,” Lance yelled. 

Pidge nodded nearly shaking off her glasses. Shiro huffed and made a grumbling sound in the back of his thought in agreement. 

“And I am truly sorry for that, and if there is any way for us to help you,” Allura said.

Shiro tapped the floor and began to write out words. Everyone craned their necks over to read what he was saying. 

“W-E-C-A-N, we can, W-R-I-T-E, write, O-U-T out, W-O-R-D-S words. We can write out words,” Matt read.

“But Coran and I don’t understand human writing,” Allura pointed out. 

“Right…”

“And how will we pilot the lions like this?” Keith pointed out.

“Yeah and why weren’t you two affected like we were?” Hunk asked. 

“What are we going to do once we get back to Earth?” 

“Yeah, if the Garrison wanted to get a look at us before then they’ll want to dissect us now.”  
“Totally.”

“This is like some area 51 junk.”

“Worse than that! This like some bad fanfiction!”

Pidge and Shiro had about a million things to say but couldn’t voice them. Well they could, but it was a flawed system to say the least. Someone was going to have to teach the Alteans English and vice versa. Or better yet, change them back. And soon, thought Shiro looking at the state of his team’s panic. 

“Like what even are these stupid this?” Lance yelled yanking down on his ear.

“Yeah, and these!” Hunk grabbed his tusks.

“Oh please! At least you’re not a deer!” Pidge yelled extending her wings and stomping. 

“No idea, Pidge! No quiznacking clue as to what you are saying!”

“I know!”

“This is so stupid.”

“How do we even fix this?”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay for bad science based off my American Public School Education!

"Palladians, if it is ok, can we relocate to the Medbay?” Coran asked cutting into the chaotic conversation like a knife. “I think it would be best to get data on your new ah… changes.” 

Everyone nodded. 

“But how do we get Shiro out of here? The doors too low for him to get out,” Keith said rubbing his arms, still chilly.

“Hhmm that is a problem.”

“Is there any way we can bring the stuff we need here?”

”I’m afraid not, it’s all hooked into walls and such.”

“Not to mention, we would have you get you out of here sometime,” Allura pointed out addressing Shiro who bit his lip looking at just how narrow the halls were for him.

“We’d have to take apart the ship,” Hunk said, “Unless Shiro cut off his wings and folded himself over a bunch which is just physically impossible.

“Yeah, no, not doing that,” Shiro said shaking his head.

“And we can’t take apart the ship,” Coran said it would take years to do in the first place and almost as much time to repair it.”

“What’s above us?” Pidge asked. Matt flicked an ear and gasped falling to his knees to address her at eye level.

“What did you just say?” He yelled wide-eyed.

“I asked what’s above this room. Why? Wait! Can you understand me?”

“I, I think I can! Some of it? Did you ask what’s above us?”

She nodded, “Yes! Am I still speaking deer?”

“Is she?” Matt asked turning to the others.

“Is she what?” asked Hunk.

“Speaking deer?”

“Totally. Not a word makes sense.”

“But I’m speaking English right?”

“Yep.”

“So you can understand deer now?”

“I guess I can. Or maybe it’s just Pidge? But it makes sense. I hear it as deer, but somehow I still know what she’s saying. It’s like hearing sentences in a foreign language, it sounds different, but you can still understand it. ”

“You’re not understanding, you’re undeerstanding,” Hunk joked.

“In all seriousness, this is good, great,” Pidge said, “I’m just glad one person can understand what I’m saying.”

“Yeah it is. So what is above us?” Matt asked.

“If I am correct, another hallway. Still too narrow to work. I belive it leads to the… royal quarters,” Coran replied twirling his mustache in thought.

Shiro looked down thinking, not only was he stuck as a dragon, a huge fire breathing monster, he was also going to be stuck in the same room. This was too much, even for him. He was freed from some of the worst places among enemies and here he was chaged among his friends and family.

He slumped down on the floor laying his head between his arms with a huff. Smoke curled out of his large nostrils causing everyone to stare. He looked at his snout shocked. 

“Uh, Shiro? What was that?” Lance asked watching it float up and disperse.

“I have no idea,” he said shaking his head.

“Are you denying what you just did?”

“No no, I don’t know what it was. I mean, I do, but-”

“Shiro, you just exhaled smoke. That means you can breathe fire.”

“So, wait, if that’s true, then dose that mean that all the myth about dragons are true for Shiro?” Pidge asked Matt. 

“Maybe,” he shrugged.

“So, hypothetically speaking, he could turn himself into a human?”

“Oooh. I see. Shiro, Pidge is wondering that if the part about dragons breathing fire is true, then is the story of them being able to make themselves look human true for you as well,” Matt explained.

Shiro’s scaly ears shot up at the idea. It was farfetched, but so was everything else about their lives at this point.

“Would you want to try it?” Keith asked.

He thought for a second, no pain in trying right? If it didn’t work, it didn’t work, but if it did… There wasn’t a risk really. He nodded and stood up. 

He closed his eyes and began to breathe deeply and calmly. He pictured himself as a human. With his white streaked black hair. His robotic arm in a normal shape with five fingers. He thought about what it felt like to stand on two legs and his normal height. All the things he could do, what it felt like to pilot the black lion. He thought about his friends and how they were his family. His new space family: Keith, Lance, Hunk, Pidge, Allura, Coran. And now Matt again. All the times they had looked out for each other, the time that they had spent together. They needed his help, and he needed theirs. They looked out for each other. He loved them. 

He sighed his body feeling tingly and weightless. Not the kind that zero Gs provided, more like the kind that you felt when falling asleep. The kind that made you feel like you were falling but not in a bad way. It was like he was slipping downward slowly, like floating down a river in a raft. It was relaxing. Shiro opened his eyes. 

“Shiro! You’re back!” Keith yelled. 

He had returned to his normal height and was, more or less, on eye level with everyone else. Looking himself up and down, he saw that he was human.

Well, kind of, he was mostly human. He still had the wings and tail. They poked out of his clothes in a way that felt uncomfortable and prone to rubbing. Probably would be best to cut those holes larger and hem them. There were patches of scales haphazardly slapped onto him in random places. His curved horns sprouted out of scull where his shaved sides stopped. The added weight felt strange to say the least. 

Shiro smiled revealing sharp teeth, “I am. I’m back. Pidge, do you want to try?”

“Might as well,” she stood up fully and breathed in. 

Pidge squeezed her eyes shut. How did Shiro do this? Dragons were supposed to do this, were, what was she, preytons, supposed to do this too? Ok, ok, human, think. Human, what did she look like? She had brown hair, brown eyes, Matt’s borrowed shirt from when she had to be a boy, her orange boots, and her glasses. Glasses that fit her face, not some dumb deer snout. Her glasses were her brother’s just wore them so often that they had made her vision go bad. She had short messy brown, layered hair with bangs that could stand to be trimmed. She was short. And that was ok. Short’s not bad, she could get into small spaces, get into the air ducts. It helped her and her team a couple times. She wore orange boots, weird as they may look, were very comfortable. Better than hooves. She was a coms officer, and hacker. One who piloted a giant green robot in space. 

A warm fuzzy feeling pricked her lower stomach, her primary feathers, the backs of her front legs her tongue, her collarbones, elbows and spread to other weird and random places. She felt like she was caught up in a tractor beam and was rising. Something shifted around in her stomach sending a feeling of serenity up her spine, between her wings, to the base of her skull. 

“Pidge?”

She opened her eyes blinking away… something. She wasn’t sure what, but it didn’t seem to have a word. 

“I think you got it,” Shiro said.

Pidge looked herself over seeing her regular body. Normal save for her tail feathers, wings, ears, small antlers, and fur in random patches. Her hands had been given the same treatment as Matt’s. And hooves instead of feet. Hooves.

Why?

Hooves, the new bane of her existence. 

Coran ran up behind her and Shiro and hugged them with one arm each as hard as possible. Pidge yelled and Shiro just looked at him in confusion. “Oh I’m just so glad to have you two ok.”

“It’s good to be the right height,” Shiro said worming his way out.

“You’re telling me,” Pidge said crossing her arms with a smile. She smiled wider hearing her normal voice come out. 

“Now!” Coran said regaining his regular composure, “To the Medbay. Let’s see what’s up with you earthlings.” 

The group began to walk to the hallway. The were just a few problems. 

Keith soon realized that he did not know how to slither. He glared down at the appendage. 

Shiro turned around and looked at his issue. 

“So, having trouble walking?”

“Yeah, but it’s not really walking anymore,” he said looking at Shiro who smiled weakly. 

“You’re right. Want some help?”

“Can you?”

“I can try,” Shiro put his arm on Keith shoulder. “I’m sorry this is happening. I’m going to try to get everyone through this.”

“You don’t need to be sorry. This isn’t your fault; we don’t even know what this is!”

“True, come one. S shapes right?”

“Yeah.”

Keith lifted the end of his tail up about a foot and set it back down. 

“Do I start with the end closest to… me or tail?”

“I would say do whatever feels the most natural.”

Keith nodded, he began to shift and move the mussels in his tail. Flesh underneath the scales moved in response scooting its way forward dragging the brain that controlled it with it. It didn’t move like a snake, it was move like he picked up one side of his tail, moved a small part of it forward and did the same with the other side still trying to act like it was two legs. 

“Good, but I don’t think that’s going to get you very far any time soon.” 

Keith groaned, “I know.”

“Try not to think about it so hard.”

“So not patience yields focus this time?”

“Not sure it applies to this situation.”

After a few more tries Keith got the hang of it as slow as it was. Then the group made their way to the Medbay. 

Soon, everyone was hooked up to some kind of machine that was rattling off data on screens with electrodes stuck to their forehead. They were supplied with a cup of the hot chocolate like substance that they had found at the space mall. Keith had curled up with a blanket around him. He was resting his head in his arm and his arms on one of his coils. His cup was sitting on the floor next to him. He still looked a little groggy. Lance was sitting down, legs folded in, on a spread out blanket. Another was spread over his horse back. He was sipping his drink. Hunk was sitting down next to Lance practically lean against him. Pidge was inspecting her wings with her face in a turned up expression. Matt was sitting next to her looking down at his drink thinking. He had taken his place after giving his cape like jacket to Keith who, for once, did not object to the help. Instead, he wrapped it around himself savoring the warmth it had from body heat. Lance had also done the same earlier. Both Pidge and Matt had issues holding their cups due to the subtraction of a digit. Shiro was next to Keith for extra warmth as everyone pestered Allura and Coran.

“So what are the tests?”

“Same as when you first got here,” replied Allura.

“Heartrate, brainwaves, temperature, reaction to stimuli, the works. We are currently doing both brainwaves and heartrate at the same time. We would like to preform a DNA test to see just how deep the changes go.”

They had already taken everyone’s temperature. Hunk’s was relatively normal. Keith’s however were still rather low. They had also taken X-rays of the group that flashed on the divided screen on the wall next to the data being compiled and analyzed. PETs, CTs, MRIs, and other much more advanced scans were also displayed.

“So why weren’t either of you changed?” Asked Shiro. 

“Well our best working theory is the energy readings from the nebula that surrounded the abandoned ship were highly similar to pure quintessence. The particles in the dust behaved rather oddly because of it.”

“Yeah, but how dose energy do this to us?” Pidge asked gesturing to herself and the others.

“We’re not sure,” Allura explained,” Quintessence is like a form of radiation. However, it has an unspecific frequency. This means that it can be in any form you can think of. Alteans have a sort of resistance to some radiation and quintessence. This is how we are able to manipulate it through training. However, you er, earthlings,” she was hesitant to still call them humans, “have a much lower tolerance for it. This… transformation seems to be a result of that.”

“Huh?”

“Ok, your planet is much farther away from the sun then Altea was to our star. This means that you get less solar radiation. This also means that we had to evolve in the conditions. It is also safe to say that we are move evolved than earth creatures. I mean no offence by that, I say this simply because of our timelines and adaptations like camouflage. 

“And with our technological advancements and amount we are around technology that has, at least minor, radiation, we have grown a sort of resistance for it. We also use and manipulate quintessence, which is a form of radiation that does not have a specific place on the spectrum.   
“Now, am I wrong when I say that radiation can cause mutations?”

“No.”

“Exactly. This is just like that, only, this has turned you all into something different.”

“But how does that translate into Earth mythology?” Lance objected. 

“We’re still not sure,” Coran admitted.

“Do you know if this can be reversed?” Shiro asked. 

“Again, we don’t know.”

Lance’s heart sunk. His family, he already missed them, what would they say if he came home a horse. If he came back at all.

“But,” Coran said trying to remain positive for the team, “the sooner we get some tests done, the sooner we will have an idea about this whole thing. Now, let’s start with something quick while we do heart and brain wave, reaction to stimuli!”

“Stimuli?”

“Electric shock!” Coran pushed a button on a panel and electricity bit from their electrodes. All cried out ‘ow’ in resistance.

Keith glared slightly, “little warning next time?”

“Now I know how people feel when I hit them with my bayard!” Pidge groaned flapping open her wings. Matt laughed admiring them. He had not gotten a good look at them. They were light brown with stripes of those similar to a pigeon. Only, her coloration was off with mint green stripes and the rest of the wing being brownish white. 

“Sorry about that. Your reaction times all seem normal,” Coran explained with a smile, “Pidge, Shiro, wings out please.”

“What for?”

“Wing span measurements of course!” 

Pidge and Shiro compiled and opened their wings as wide as they could go. Shiro’s were bat like in structure. The spines were black like the rest of his scales with grey splotches in random places. The membrane had a gradient to it starting with a light grey, and into a much darker, almost black, grey. 

Allura and Coran walked over with a device that looked like a projection version of a tape measurer. They began to measure not only, wings, but everything. From everyone’s new height, to the length of their legs, or tail in Keith’s case. 

The results were not much help. Keith was now almost three times long as he was once tall. Both Shiro and Pidge’s wings could dwarf a Turkey vulture’s. Lance, as if he needed it, gained an extra three inches and tail of eleven point five inches. He honestly wanted to groom the thing. 

Lance, as it turned out, had also grown a mane like column of hair running the length of normal human spine, fading just before his foreleg’s shoulder blades. It desperately needed conditioner. 

Hunk’s tail was a little longer than Lances, but was a complete different in structure, more like a lion with a tuff of fur at the end. The shortest tail was Matt’s and the longest, besides Keith’s replacement for legs, was Shiro’s. 

“Alright, everyone can remove their electrodes and heart rate monitors,” Allura informed them. “We should have enough of that data.” 

“Ah, Lance, not you yet. We are seeing an anomaly on your results,” Coran objected.

Lance paled. “Is-is there something wrong?”

“I’m not sure. It looks like there are two heart beats on your monitor.” He pulled up his results on a screen. Indeed, two lines rose and fell in unison. Lance’s hand slowly rose to his chest grabbing his shirt. The lines both went faster and the beeping louder. 

“Is that bad?”

“Not that we can see so far. That’s why we want to have you wear the monitor for just a little longer, to see if there is a problem.” 

“Would there be?”

“Unless they begin to beat at different rates. It is likely that your new body needs two hearts too pump all of your blood.”

“Where is the other one?” Lanced asked trying to find his pulse on his neck.

“The one in your, ah human… chest has not moved.” Lance nodded. “And the other is in the front of your, lower half? What animal did you say you were part?”

“Horse,” Lance swallowed. “Keiths part snake, Pidge and Matt are part deer and the wings are from birds. Shiro and Hunk are probably a mix of a bunch of different animals.”

“Are those common Earth animals?”

“Depends on where you are on Earth. It is more common to see a deer in a forest than in a dessert,” replied Shiro.

Allura and Coran looked confused. “How biodiverse is your planet?”

“Uh, very?”

“We have a lot of biodiversity. Most animals can’t live anywhere else but the place that they are.”

“How strange, most planets are only one or two environments. How many do you have?”

“Um, forest, rainforest, grasslands, oceans have a bunch, taiga technically, the tropical areas desserts of course,” Lance informed. “What else?”

“Tundra,” Hunk supplied.

“Mountains can have their own climates sometimes and can be a different biome than the surrounding area entirely,” Matt pointed out.

“Right. And isn’t the area around the Mediterranean its own thing,” asked Pidge looking to Matt who translated.

“Mediter-what?” Allura asked.

“Ah, it’s ah, a sea and the land around it is a different temperature than it should be based on its global position…? Guys?”

“Do you have a map of Earth?”

“No, I’m afraid we don’t.”

“We really need to take you there. Explaining this stuff is getting tiring.”

“In any case, Earth sounds like one of the most diverse planets we have seen. Not to mention the strange atmospheric conditions you get there like that rain stuff and the hail. Oh and what was it? Sleet! That stuff sounds terrible!”

“Yeah, Earth’s pretty great isn’t it,” Lance said smiling.

"Actually, the diversity of Earth could explain a lot. Human from what it sounds like are rather versatile and easily adaptable. You can live in all of these places and not just survive, but thrive. It's fascinating really! But, it may be because of this that your changes were so radical. This gas may have just speed up your natural adaptive properties." 

"Like some kind of evolution?"

"Precisely!"

“So that leads us to our next test, dental scans,” Coran said with a twirl of his mustache. 

“How are those connected?” Lance asked.

“Never mind that! Mouth open, let’s see those teeth!”

Each of the paladins and Matt opened their mouths and stuck out their tongue while Coran came around with a stick and a blueish flashlight looking device. The light scanned their mouths and created holograms on the screen. 

The results were odd, but that was almost expected at that point. Lance and Matt’s teeth hadn’t changed much if any. Human and deer teeth were similar enough so that, while that had moved around her jaw, aside from the lack of canines, Pidge’s teeth were not all that different. Shiro’s were much sharper but not any bigger than they were before while in human form. Hunk had developed the tusks and the underbite, as everyone could see, but his teeth had sharpened in the front but dulled in the back leaving him with rounded looking molars. Keith now had fangs thrown into a mouth of sharp teeth, even his molars looked sharper. His fangs were where his canines used to be giving his an almost vampiric look; in addition, his tongue was split down the middle making it forked and was skinnier. It had also darkened several shades making it a maroon color.

“Well, that’s certainly different…” Hunk mused at the screen. “How can Keith and I even still talk normally?”

“I’m not sure of the specifics, or even how, but you bodies are being reprogramed taking, not only used your mythology, but also how your natural forms work into account. We don’t know how else to put it but something is keeping you all like you previously were. While your changes may be drastic at first, they seem to be following that basic human structure,” Coran said.

“What do you mean? I turned into a deer!” Pidge yelled.

“Yes, but both you and Shiro were able to change back. Mostly. And while you were one, Matt was able to understand you even if it did take some time to do so.”

“So where is this going?” Keith asked.

“Something’s keeping you from being fully mutated.”

“Or at least is keeping you from not being able to do the things you would normally do.”

“So are you saying that whatever did this to us was alive?” Shiro asked.

“No, no, just that there is something inside you making sure that you don’t change too much. Or if you do, there’s some way to get you back.”

“What Pidge and Shiro did should not be possible the way they did it which leads to the question, could they do it again,” Allura said with a frown. 

“No thank you,”

“Not now.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t exactly like being that height, or not being able to talk, or having four legs. Or any of it. And I sure don’t like even if I am more human looking right now,” Pidge explained. 

“Yes well, we just want to see if you can do it. You would not have to stay in that form for long.”

“You promise?”

“I promise. I recognize that this is a emotional, high stress situation for you, it is for us too. However, I cannot begin to image what this is like.” 

“Nor can I, we are so deeply sorry,” Coran said.

“I’ll do it, but you can’t say anything if I can’t,” Pidge agreed. 

“Me too,” Shiro said, “Can’t let you have all the fun, can I?”

“Then here, put back on the monitors.”

Allura and Coran strapped them back on and backed up allowing them to stand up. Both closed their eyes.

How did they do this? Think like a monster? An animal? Or did they just think about what they looked like? Deer, thought Pidge, just turn into a deer, how hard can it be? 

Dragon, what did that feel like? Awkward, that’s how it felt. Big, bulky, and awkward.

Their monitors beeped loudly as they read the strange 

“Nice job, you two,” Allura congratulated.

Wait? Wait they had done it? Opening their eyes, they saw it. They were both full on monsters. 

“Well, that was easy,” Pidge remarked.

“Yeah It took way less time than you turning human,” Matt said.

“So both of your heart rates didn’t follow their regular, or any, pattern. They sped up and slowed down at random intervals. However, they seem to have gone back to normal. Your brain waves also have strange readings,” Coran informed pointing to the dips and rises in the lines. “This shouldn’t be a problem unless they stay inconsistent.” 

“Can you think straight? Are there any memories you can’t acess?”

Shiro shook his head.

“Everything mentally feels normal,” explained Pidge allowing Matt to translate.

“Well that is a relief,” Allura said with a sigh.

“Why?” 

“Well the scans show something off in part of your brains. We’re not sure what they are. They could be new instincts or urges or even parts that needed to develop in order for you to operate your new limbs and other parts. I just wanted to make sure that it wasn’t anything that could be harmful.”

“Instincts?” asked Hunk.

“Yes, but that could be just a theory. It could be anything.”

“But you’re saying that I could start doing things against my will?” 

“Yes, but-“

“Nope, no thank you. This is already weird enough,” Lance groaned. 

“Have any of you experienced this already?”

“Yes, my ears and tail won’t stop moving and twitching,” Matt said

“Same here,” Lance said.

“Anyone else?” Allura asked typing on a tablet.

“Me,” Pidge said, “same symptoms.”

“Raise your hand if you are having this problem.”

Everyone. Everyone was having this problem. Keith’s tongue would dart out taking samples of the air and no one was quite sure why. Shiro couldn’t place what he was feeling, but he knew it sure wasn’t normal. Hunk’s tail would also move on its own, but less frequently.

“Oh my. Let’s just hope that it’s only this and it doesn’t progress any further.” 

“Oh, Pidge, Shiro, wingspans again!” Coran said holding up the measurer again.

Pidge and Shiro groaned opening their wings again. Shiro had to hunker down and let Coran get on top of him for them to be able to get to them. 

“Thank you, they have grown in order to keep proportionate for both er forms. Pidge’s did not experience much change but Shiro did. Likely due to him growing so much in general.” 

“I do wonder, if Pidge and Shiro were able to make themselves look more human, would any of you?” asked Allura. 

“I’m willing to try,” Lance offered propping himself up using a wall and Hunk. “Just think about being human right?”

They nodded and Lance shut his eyes the same way they had.

What made Lance human? His family? His friends? His thoughts? His love for people? Those were all good things that made up him. He supposed many of the didn’t change now that he had a horse butt, so what made him human? Was it completely physical? Allura and Coran, although they did have the same traditions as him and the other humans and were in every sense of the word aliens, could probably fit right into human culture. Aside from the appearance and the Alttean phrases. And Keith was part Galra but no less human than everyone else. He was just unruly at times but honestly, so were a lot of other people who were completely human. So what made him human? It was likely all physical at this point. He focused hard on what he looked like adding extra emphasis on his feet and legs.

When he felt satisfied and disoriented, he opened his eyes. Nothing had changed. 

“Nope,” he concluded disappointedly. 

“Hmmm, maybe it has something to do with your clothes.”

“My clothes? What about ‘em?”

“Well with Pidge and Shiro, speaking of feel free to change back at any time, their clothes went somewhere, they were… saved somewhere. Your clothes did not, they were ripped up.”

“But correlation is causation,” pointed out Hunk.

“True, but it is unwise to eliminate any evidence.”

“So speaking of, where are my pants?” Lanced asked sitting back down.

“After you all had finished transforming, we moved all of your clothes to your rooms if they were salvageable. Lance and Keith, yours were torn to shreds so we had to throw them out.” 

I really liked those pants, Keith thought. 

“And our shoes?”

“In your rooms.”

“How badly were those broken?” 

“Lance, yours were fine, but Keith, I‘m not sure if you could wear them again. I took them off before they could be too stretched out.”

“Thanks,” Keith said. He had finally warmed up thanks to the extra jackets and body heat. 

“Ok, so, now that we have those tests done, it might be best to test your abilities like endurance and strength if you are up to it,” Coran said.

“Actually,” Allura spoke up, “I think we should get something to eat and see how your diets are being effected.”

“Good idea,” Shiro agreed folding his tail in without realizing it.

“So, what do we eat?”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good luck to all who are taking exams/mid-terms like me. Don't die, stay strong. Just remember that winter break is coming soon. And hey! Did you all hear about the object that passed Earth from ANOTHER SOLAR SYSTEM. It is an interstellar object! In our solar system! It's shape is hard for the universe to naturally make. Even the closest star is 4.37 light years away. And that's the speed of LIGHT. This is a rock man! Some people even think that it might be ALIENS! We're scanning that thing for everything including water. It's name is Oumuamua. We named the thing messenger! How cute is that like, come on! How is this not interesting to people! Even if it's not aliens, it would take a tromendus force for something to escape another star's orbit. As a fan of Voltron be excited! As a human be excited! As an Earthling get exited! IT'S NOT FROM THE SOLAR SYSTEM!

Lunch left both Keith and Shiro hurling up their guts. Neither could hold down the food goo. For whatever reason the hot cholate had not seemed to affect them, but food goo they couldn’t stomach so it didn’t stay put. 

Shiro had held it down a little longer than Keith had, but not by much. 

“Let’s not try that again,” Keith said leaning his head back when they had regrouped at the table. He sat in the chair slightly awkwardly but at least he had kept his unlike Lance who was resting his weight on his folded back legs.

“Agreed,” Shiro said nodding. 

“How are the rest of you feeling?” Allura asked.

“I don’t feel that sick, maybe just a bit queasy,” Hunk said.

“That’s surprising,” Lance joked.

“I just feel… kinda hungry. Not really? You guys?” Pidge asked adjusting her wings. Both she and Shiro had issues fitting them into their chair. So far they had both wacked them into people and things an innumerable amount of times.

“Like unsatisfied,” Matt replied. 

“Yeah.”

“Is there something else that any of you would like? We don’t have much else other than the food goo, but I’m sure we can find you something,” Coran said with a smile. 

“I’m fine, nothing sounds good,” Lance said.

“Same.”

“I don’t think I’m hungry for anything we have on the ship.”

“Yeah.” 

“Where else would we get food?”

“How do we know what we’re even supposed to eat now?” Keith asked.

“Well what do snakes eat?”

“Meat. Crap, we don’t have any on the ship,” Shiro said inhaling, “Dragons would eat the same thing.”

“There’s no meat in the goo. Alteans don’t eat meat typically. That must have been what upset your stomachs,” Allura said.

“We could get some at the swap mall,” offered Coran.

“Alien meat?”

“Do we even know would be safe for humans to eat?” Matt asked.

“We’re not exactly human anymore,” Pidge pointed out.

“Then what would be safe for earthlings to eat?”

“Trial and error?” Hunk joked

“Based on your scans, we should be able to determine what is safe for you to eat.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“But how are we going to pay for it?”

“Ah…”

“Do you not have any GAC?” Matt asked.

“Unfortunately not,” Allura said with a frown.

“I have some,” he smiled.

“You do?” Pidge asked. “How?”

“Long story, but back when I was still training, me and a couple of rebel buddies once stole some from a banking ship that was in our patrol area.”

“Like a space train robbery?”

“Yep! More like pirates actually.”

“You’re kidding me! What else did you? Learn how to use the force?”

“That’s great, Matt, but are you sure you wouldn’t mind us borrowing some?” Shiro asked. “I can’t say that we’ll be able to pay you back.”

“What else am I going to spend it on? Food seems like a pretty good use for it to me.”

“So we’re doing this? Now?”

“If it’s ok with you Shiro.”

He thought it over, on one hand, they needed food, but on the other, he didn’t know if he, or the rest of the team, was ready for this. It had only been a couple of vargas. No one was comfortable yet. If they ever would be. But they needed food.

“How about tomorrow? I think it would be best to get used to this whole thing, or at least let it settle in before we do anything. Not to mention a good night’s rest would do us all some good. Until then, we can just eat what we have here. Ok?”

“I think resting up is a good idea,” Allura smiled, “let me or Coran know the second we can be of any service.”

“Thank you, we will.”

“Whelp, I’m thinking about doing just that,” Lance announced standing at his full height. “Sleep sounds good right now. Who knows, maybe that’s all this thing needs to go away, sleep.”

“I doubt that, Lance,” Keith said smirking.

“Worth a shot.”

“I’ll walk with you,” Hunk offered, “I’m probably just going to rest too. Besides, can’t have you falling and breaking your neck now can we?”

“I don’t know…” Keith smirked.

“Uh! I’m offended!”

“So how you holding up?” Hunk asked once the pair had made it a ways down the hall. 

“I don’t know, man. This is all so weird!” Lance groaned putting his head in his hands lifting his elbows up. “I mean, what am I supposed to do? This whole thing it’s just… just so… I don’t know. It still doesn’t feel like it’s real. But it is. Are we still human? Allura and Coran have started calling us ‘earthlings’ now so that’s just cliché as this whole thing.” He sighed. “You?”

“Same as you.”

Lance’s hoof slid out from under him again causing Hunk to catch him. 

“Thanks, man.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“And that’s another thing, I can’t even walk right!”

“Just try to give that some time, who knows, maybe by the time you figure out how to, this whole thing will be over.”

“Which thing? The giant space robot thing or the oh quiznack we’re monsters thing?”

“Both?”

Next came the elevator. The residence rooms were in the upper levels true to the fairy tales. However, instead of spiral staircases, the castle had elevators. This was a huge relief to Lance who did not want to deal with stairs. The pair crammed their way into one and it ascended. 

“Can I ask you a question?” Lance spoke up.

“Sure. You just did.”

“Oh ha ha, haven’t heard that one before.”

“Ok ok, shoot.”

“Is my face wacked up?”

“What do you mean?”

“Have you seen yours?”

“No. Is there something wrong with it!?” 

“Aside from the tusks and horns, your eyes are… different, let’s get to a mirror.”

Lance opened the door to his room and Hunk ran into his bathroom and screamed.

“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

The whites of Hunk’s eyes had turned black and his iris a bright glowing yellow. His pupils were normal even if you could see their whole size with the way his eyes were open wide in shock. His ears her starched out and pointy at the top. Yellow fur hung off their tips and grew on their back. Hunk grabbed at them rubbing the soft fuzzy material.

“They don’t look… bad,” Lance said following him in. Or rather, he tried to but he didn’t fit so he popped his head in instead.

“Not bad? Lance! I look like a monster!

Lance stole a quick look at his own face, nothing. His ears stuck up a bit too high for his liking and made his face look even narrower than it already did. 

“Hunk, we all do. Just look at Shiro and Pidge.”

He sighed “Let’s just hope there’s a solution to this whole thing. I am not looking forward to seeing any new instincts. Alteans are so lucky.”

Lance grimaced at the thought, “Me neither, buddy.”

“Need anything else before I go?”

“My old legs back?” he smiled. “Nah, thanks for helping me.”

“I cannot believe this has only been one day! Not even really! More like half.”

“I’m just going to sleep it away. If I can even figure out how I’m supposed to sleep like this that is. I wonder what the others are doing.”

“Probably something dangerously stupid.”

“Without us? We’re the kings of stupid ideas!”

“Lance, we’re currently in space because of a stupid idea to sneak out in the middle of the night to, and let’s see if I can remember this right, ‘bond as a team and hit the town and grab some chicks’.” He sat down on Lance’s bed.

“Sounds about right.”

“You are so predictable, Lance.”

“At least I’m reliable.” He smirked taking off his shirt and opening up his drawers for a sleep shirt. 

“So you’re seriously going to sleep?”

“Might as well. What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Hunk turned to Lance. “I feel tiered too so maybe sleep? I might just figure out what else is up with me?”

“Have fun with that. Maybe you can find out what to use that tail for.”

“Maybe.” He stood up, “Whelp. I’ll see you tomorrow I guess.” 

“You too.”

“Night.”

Hunk walked down to his room and straight to his bed. He fell on it face first and groaned into his pillows and blankets. He stayed there for vargas and just slept. 

 

“Good morning, paladins!” Coran yelled cheerfully over the coms.

Pidge woke with a start She had fallen asleep typing on her laptop the previous night and it was still on her bad. However, she had also woken up as a deer. 

 

Shiro was also startled awake. He fell of his bed and found himself not human as well. He landed in a pile of scales and wings. His eyes raced rapidly looking for what had woken him up.

“Rise and shine!”

Hunk screamed and jumped up from his position from the night before. He had also forgotten to change so he was still wearing his normal clothes.

“Breakfast in 10 dobashes!”

Lance just threw a pillow at his intercom and groaned at it. “Noooo! Sleeeeep!”

“Now, that’s no way to be. Everyone up!”

Keith uncoiled himself and drew up to his full height. He slowly slithered to the bathroom and began inspecting his scales. 

Matt sat up in bed blinking slowly. Awake, great, he thought, morning. 

“Nice to see you all up and moving around,” Allura said once they had all entered the dining room. Coran was busy making some kind of a strange scrambled food goo thing on the stove. 

“Why are we up so early?” Hunk asked sitting down and filling his cup up with water from a pitcher on the table.

“There’s a reason the time you do after someone dies is called mourning,” Pidge said reaching for the alien equivalent of coffee. 

“Early? You’ve sleep in an extra three vargas! It’s not even morning anymore,” Coran said pointing a spatula at them.

“No we haven’t.”

“We keep logs of this stuff,” Allura interjected.

“Then why did you let us sleep that long?” Lance asked poking his food goo that Coran had placed in front of him.

“And when are we leaving for the space mall?” Shiro asked. Both him and Pidge had walked down a little later due to trying to ‘shift’ as they had stared to call it. 

“Because you were tiered, but this late just got ridiculous.”

“Actually, we are already on the way. We’ll be there in about a varga. That should give you enough time to get ready.”

“Now, how did you all sleep?”

“Apparently as a deer,” Pidge quipped, “I went to bed all human-y and woke up with four legs!”

“I also woke up as a dragon,” Shiro said, his tail instinctively wrapping around his chair’s leg.

“Do you know why?”

“Well, I would imagine that it takes a lot of energy to hold this form. Your body probably just did what it could to get the most out of sleep and conserve energy.”

“Do you think that is just going to be a regular thing for us?”

“With practice, you may be able to control it, but for the time being, I wouldn’t worry about it unless you cannot change back,” Coran said sitting down with them. He hadn’t bothered to set out plates for Keith and Shiro. Matt and Hunk had ate some of theirs to be polite, but weren’t enjoying it. 

“Hey, why did we sleep so long?” Keith asked.

“Alteans experience something similar when we shapeshift for long periods of time. The first time an Altean can shift, even if it is just color, they tend to sleep. You earthlings are not meant to shift like we are. And you went through a huge biological change,” Allura explained.

“Why do you keep calling us ‘earthlings’?” Lance asked.

“Pidge said it herself, you’re not exactly human anymore. We are just using it as a word to address you as a group. However, if you would like for us to stop, then we can,” Allura said gesturing to Lance’s legs.

“You call us Alteans,” Coran pointed out.

“Yeah but… fair point.”

“Checkmate.”

“Now! If you’re done eating, then go and get ready to go!”

 

“We are not coming back with a cow this time. Ok?” Shiro said crossing his arms as everyone walked into the mall. With all the strange features of the other customers, they doubted anyone would bat an eye at any of them in this state. Hopefully no one recognized them as the paladins of Voltron. 

“But, Shiro, don’t you think that Kaltenecker is getting a little bit lonely?”

“With you as another farm animal, I think she’s got all the friends she needs,” Keith teased.

“Well maybe they’ll have a lizard for you and Shiro to make friends with.”

“Enough,” Shio said moving the two boys away from each other.

“Dose everyone have their list of what to look for?” asked Allura.

“Yes,” everyone said in unison.

“Dose everyone have their GAC?”

“Yes.”

“No one is going to wander around this place alone like last time, so Coran made a random name generator for the team. Who wants to go first?”

“Oh oh! Me!” Hunk said reaching up his hand. He took the tablet from Coran and pressed the go button. “Lance! Let’s go!”

“Woo!” They high fived and Hunk gave to tablet to Keith.

“Pidge,” he announced handing off to Shiro.

“Well this is alarming,” Pidge said elbowing Keith.

“Matt, no surprise there I guess,” Shiro said handing the screen back to Coran. 

“Good. The team that finds the least amount of items on their list has to do the laundry,” Allura said with a wink.

“Are you two a team?” asked Matt.

“Yes, but we have our own list and as such will not be included in the competition.”

“Well we’ll see you all back here in about two vargas for a check in and lunch.”

“And no cows or other Earth animals.”

“So, where should we start?” Matt asked as the pair set out. 

 

“Well, even if he was joking, Lance did have an idea with looking in the Earth shop.”

“Great, so where is it?” 

“Let’s go find someone to ask.”

 

“What first?” Hunk asked Lance as he looked at the list.

“Well, if we’re looking for food, then let’s go where the food is. Didn’t you say this place has a food court?”

“Yeah, but I can’t say they’ll be too happy to see me,” he warned.

“Maybe, or maybe they’ll get us a discount! Come on, let’s go.”

“Right behind ya, buddy!”

 

“Alright, where to, Keith?”

“Uh... I thought you would have an idea,” he said looking down at the rather furry girl.

“Last time we were here, I ran around in a fountain getting money to buy a video game. I clearly have no clue what I’m doing.”

“Ok then um… how do Earth malls work?”

“You’re asking me?’

“Clearly. I’ve never been to one.”

“Wish I could say the same. Our best shot is to find a directory. That would be…”

“There!” Keith pointed to a holographic plaque in front of an ornate flower garden with metal shards sticking out like stalagmites.

“Perfect!”

They rushed over and tapped on the large start button in the center. A 3-D model rose up from the stand and a voice asked what they were looking for. 

“Uh… floorplan?”

“I’m sorry, but the request you have entered has no results. Please try again.”

“List of stores.”

“I’m sorry, but the request you have entered has no results. Please try again.”

Keith looked to Pidge, “I have no idea how to work this.”

Pidge looked at the hologram. “Ok, so the triangle is the ‘You are here’ sign I’m assuming… and around is looks to be clothing stores… That looks like some kind of beauty store…” Pidge looked over to Keith, “The problem is I can’t read alien.”

“Do you have any translation software on you?” 

“Not with me, I should have brought it. Maybe we can just ask someone.”

“We look like sleep deprived monsters.” 

“That’s because we are sleep deprived monsters,” Pidge countered.

“Well let’s just pick a floor and go,” Keith suggested.

“You pick.” 

“Uh second?” 

“Great, let’s go find the elevator.” 

They went at top speed, which was not that fast still, past shops and people keeping in mind what they went past.

“Slow pokes!” Pidge stopped yelled at someone. Keith turned his head to see whom.

Matt stuck his tongue out at them. Shiro put his hand over his eyes shaking his head.

“Come on, we cannot lose to our brothers!” Pidge grabbed Keith’s wrist and took off again. 

“We gotta find someone to ask before Keith and Pidge beat us,” Matt said while the pair scanned the atrium before Shiro said “There” and walked over.

“Excuse me?” he asked an alien leaning up against a wall. “Can you point us in the direction of the Earth store?”

She lowered a device like a teenager with a phone. “Earth?” she asked looking past her neon blue hair at the pair up with amber eyes. 

“Um human store?”

“Look buddy, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Shiro looked to Matt for help. 

“I think he means Terra. As in Terra Firma.”

“Oh, that place.” She rolled her eyes and took a sip from her cup rudely.

“Do you know it?”

She crossed her arms. “Well duh. Third floor. But you want my advice, steer clear, there’s nothing but crazies there.”

“Thanks for your help,” Matt yelled, “Come on!”

“Weirdos,” the teenager huffed one they were out of earshot, “They’ll fit in with the rest of the people in that store.”

“Keith and Pidge will be slowed down using the elevator, we can take the escalator and run,” Shiro pointed out starting to get in to competition. 

“Perfect.”

 

“Ok! Food court!” Hunk said spreading his arms in a ‘tada!’ motion.

“Alright, now where do we get food to take home from here?”

“Uhh… right, food courts aren’t grocery stores. Maybe we can get lunch?” 

“Nah, we’ll meet up with everyone else and do that. Who knows, maybe they have a grocery store here!”

“Yeah, let’s go find something like that.”

Shiro wasn’t quite sure what he was expecting from the Earth store, but a store full of 90s clothes and vacuums cleaners on the walls run by the stereotypical version of an alien, was not it. 

“Well, it is Earth stuff,” Shiro said.

“Outdated Earth stuff.”

“Well…”

“Welcome!” the alien worker said opening his arms. “Are you looking for a piece of Earth, home of the paladins of Voltron?”

“Uh…” 

Matt and Shiro exchanged a look. They were an advertisement tool now.

“Do you have any Earth food?”

“Why in fact we do! For just the low low price of 248 GAC, you can take home this boxed package deal of Earth snacks!” He held up a box with a proud looking smile.

“Uh I think we’re going to look around before making final decisions,” Shiro said grabbing Matt’s arm and walking over to where a car was on display.

“Matt! We can’t pay that!” he whispered.

“No, no Shiro. It’s ok, GAC is super inflated, one of our dollars is equivalent to about 62 of theirs. We’re paying roughly 4 dollars for a box of food.”

“Wait how much food?”

“Good question, and is it even something we would want?”

“Ah, sir?” 

“Yes?”

“Can we see what is including in the package deal?” 

“Huh? You’re interested? So nice to see some fellow Earth lovers.”

“We’re very familiar with Earth, experts even,” Matt said winking at Shiro.

“You are! Then maybe you can help me figure out what some of this stuff is! Let me get that box deal.” 

He ran into a back room and came out with a box and a few other items.

He held one up and asked, “Alright, what is this Earth weapon called?”

“That’s a hair dryer. It’s not a weapon.”

“It’s not!”

“Nope and that’s a kitchen timer.”

“And that?” he asked pointing to an old scratched up CD.

“Earthlings record music on those.”

“Facinating! How do you know all this?”

“We’ve spent a lot of time there,” Shiro said. “Can we see the food?”

“Why yes!”

He opened a beat of box to reveal multicolored wrappers in all different languages from Japanese to German. Cartoon charters and logo smiled up at them. Shiro and Matt recognized most, but there were a few that he didn’t even know if it was from this century. 

What they both loved seeing in the chaos of the box was a plastic jar of peanut butter.

“This looks perfect! We’ll take it!” Matt said.

 

“Ok, Keith, I think we’re lost,” Pidge said looking at the list. 

“Yeah, I don’t think there’s any food on this level.”

“Well then what now?”

“Next level?”

 

“Lance! Lance! Look!” Hunk pointed to a store in front of them. It had people walking in and out of its sliding door with bags in hand. “I think I found something.”

“You did?” Lance ran up catching up to him.

“Yeah, look.”

“Awesome! Let’s go!”

The walked in through the glass doors.

“Hello, and welcome to Onimarumart!” A blue alien with pink hair and purple eyes greeted them with a smile.

“Hey, cutie,” Lance flirted. Hunk grabbed a cart eying the two.

She began to laugh, “I’m sorry, I have a boyfriend. But right back at you!” She winked mimicking his finger guns. “Let me know if I can help you with anything today.” She turned to the next people walking through the door with the same cheery composure. 

“Better luck next time,” Hunk said clapping him on the back.

“Every time,” he grumbled and sighed, “She could have been perfect. Let’s go see if they have any pizza or something.”

“Mmm… what I wouldn’t do for a good burrito right now.”

They walked into the frozen section in the back of the store. Hunk knew what cooked best in the kitchens and what would fit in the ovens. In reality, it was everything one could dream of. 

“Uh, do we even know what any of this says?” Hunk asked confused looking at the pre-packaged products behind the frosted glass.

“Let’s just see what other people grab and see if it looks like Earth food,” Lance suggested.

A short four-armed man with a mustache and beard walked up about a dobash latter. He opened a glass door and began to load several packages of what looked to be frozen  
vegetables into it. He then moved on to another door and stared pulling out frozen meat.

After he left, Lance whispered to Hunk, “Let’s grab some of that. It looks like something Keith or Shiro might want to eat.”

“Yeah, or you. I wouldn’t be surprised if you eat more meat than veggies now.”

“Yeah, yeah, just start loading up.”

 

“Ok, Keith, as much as I hate to admit it, I think we just need to ask someone,” Pidge said frowning looking at the directory for the level they were on.

“Yeah maybe we nee-Wait, never mind. What’s that?” he pointed to a green tinted storefront with stand outside that had pictures of what looked to be orange watermelons.

“Oh, good eyes, Keith! Maybe that’s a produce store or something.”

“Let’s go.”

The pair entered the store. Inside were all sorts of wrong colored and shaped types of fruits and vegetables. 

“Jackpot,” Pidge said grabbing a basket and scraping what looked like blue apples and green peaches in. 

“I hope everyone else is getting some meat,” Keith said doing the same with lavender bananas and yellow strawberry looking things. 

“Yeah, I but probably wouldn’t be able to eat it.”

“I don’t know you’re part bird too.”

“Don’t remind me,” she groaned.

“Who knows, maybe wings will be helpful.”

“For what? We can just fly in our lions.”

“True.”

“Speaking of weird new stuff, do you think you’re venomous?”

“I don’t know, I haven’t thought about it, I hope not,” he finished loading and heaved it off the ground. 

“Why not? Don’t want the fangs?” Pidge asked doing the same and walking down the aisle seeing what else they could want.

“First off, I do have fangs, and they are annoying so far. They get in the way of talking, and having venom come out of them would just be the worst. As much as it might be useful, I don’t want to poison anyone. You’ve heard the expression about how it’s the youngest snakes that are the most dangerous because they don’t know how much venom to insert? It’s true and I don’t was to be those snakes,” he concluded.

“Fair enough. That’s about the same reason I don’t want to learn how to use my wings,” Pidge said walking down an aisle of nuts colored different shades of pink. “Maybe you’re a constrictor.” She began to pull levers to empty nuts into the plastic bags provided. 

“Maybe. That would probably be more beneficial to the team.”

“Yeah, but just imagine biting into your enemies to enact your poisonous vengeance,” Pidge said smiling and making claws with her hands. 

“That’s what my knife is for.”

“Whatever.

“Let’s go. It should be time to meet back up with everyone else.”

“Let’s hope we beat ‘em!” Pidge smiled following Keith to the register. 

“Especially Lance. If he beats us, then we’ll never hear the end of it.” 

“Find everything ok today?” asked a green scaly man with three eyes as he began to scan the fruit. 

“Yeah,” Keith answered sharply.

“Glad to hear it. It’s so nice to see a young couple like you two shopping together,” he said scanning item after item. “And such healthy foods too.”

“Oh! No, no, no, we’re not dating,” Keith said waving his hands in front of his chest.

“Yeah, we’re more like siblings.”

“Yeah, brother and sister.”

“My mistake,” he laughed, “Good on you for getting such healthy foods anyways. Do you have a Valptrik card?”

“No.” 

Pidge elbowed Keith. “Try to use manners,” she hissed.

“Would you be interested in signing up for one?”

“No thank you,” he looked down with stone eyes at Pidge for the las two words.

“Alright. Would you like to sign up for our mailing list? You get a 30% discount when you do and you won’t miss out on future deals.”

“We’re good,” Pidge said.

“In that case, your total is 1,486 GAC.”

Pidge and Keith exchanged a look. 

“So about that mailing list?”

 

“How did everyone’s shopping go?” asked Coran as the team sat down around a table with their lunch. The food they had selected reflected their new diets. Matt, Pidge, Allura and Coran had gotten salads. Keith and Shio were eating what looked like burgers without the cheese and bun, so just ground beef steak things. Lance was happily munching on the equivalent of a sandwich. Only, it had pink bread. 

“Someone though Keith and I were dating,’ Pidge said crossing her arms bags in the way.

Lanced roared with laughter, “Who?”

“The checkout guy,” Keith said turning red. 

“I wasn’t aware that this mall provided shipping,” Matt laughed.

“You think anyone would want to date your sister, Matt? They’re all going to turn her down,” Keith joked.

Pidge elbowed him in the ribs.

He yelped and grabbed his side. “Uh, ow,” he said.

“I hope you get a bruise, because I would turn them down.”

“So what did you tell him?” asked Shiro.

“That we were like siblings,” Pidge said.

“I thought I was your only brother,” Matt said acting offended. 

“At this point I have four and a sister.” Pidge said.

“Wouldn’t it be five?” Lance asked.

“No, you, Matt, Keith, and Hunk.”

“What about Shiro?”

“Shiro is the dad.”

“Stop calling me that. You have a real dad. He’s in space.”

“So, what did everyone buy?” Allura asked changing the subject. 

“We found a grocery store and got what looks like frozen vegetables, some meat, and heat and eat stuff.”

“And basic things that I recognized from the castle pantry,” Hunk added.

“We got produce and some nuts.”

“Oh yeah?” Matt said smirking, “That all?”

“We found Earth food,” Shiro said holding up the bag. 

“You did not.”

“We even found some peanut butter,” Matt said taking it out.

“Give. Now.” Pidge said slamming down her spork. 

“No, it is mine, I found it.” Matt hugged it to his chest.

“I will fight you for it,” Pidge said reaching for her bayard. 

“Alright, we’re not doing that. How much did everything cost in the end?” Shiro asked.

“A lot.”

“Yeah, sorry, Matt.”

“Yeah I forgot to tell you all about that, GAC is really, really inflated. Don’t worry, in the end, it probably cost about the same as a big shopping trip on Earth,” Matt explained.

“Are you kidding me?”

“We signed up for some dumb mailing list! Now the castles going to get junk mail about a space hipster health food store!” Pidge exclaimed.

"Every time we come here, something like this happens with you, Pidge. Pretty soon, we're not going to come back her because of you."

"We're already not supposed to be here."

"Yeah, but but what I mean, is that we're not going to allow you to go."

"I'll tell you the same thing I told the Garrison, you can't stop me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so was studding astronomy and Greek mythology for midterms and realized this. The moon Shiro, Matt and Sam get captured on is called Kerberos. It’s a real moon of Pluto along with Nix, Hydra and others. Kerberos is another word for Cerberus, the three-headed dog of Hades that guards the entrance of the underworld. Three heads for three astronauts. The Garrison, and for the most part the world, thought that they were dead. That they had entered the underworld. And what is on the edge of our solar system, the Kipper belt including Pluto and its moons. Depending on which direction you’re coming from, you’re either entering the solar system or interstellar space. Space can be the underworld because the world thought the crew was killed. Or the solar system can be the underworld for the Galra, if you think about it, the rising action for the whole show is when the Galra set foot in the solar system and began to mess with humans. Humans, the species of the paladins. The people who are going to be the downfall of their empire.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone leaving kudos and commenting! I'm not sure why, but there was an influx in the past week or so. It means a lot. Apologies for the delay in getting this out and a promise that the next chapters will be more eventful. Enjoy!

“So, should we get any more food?” asked Hunk after everyone had finished eating. Shiro, who had been absentmindedly gnawing on his utensil, snapped back into focus.

“Well,” Allura said looking over the list seeing what was still left, “I think we were rather successful. Unless there is something else you would still like to get, I believe we can declare Lance and Hunk the winners.”

Lance grinned and popped a high five with Hunk. “Suck it, Keith.”

“Well it’s not my fault I had Pidge,” he objected. He had wrapped his tail around the center leg of the table they were sitting at awkwardly resting on everyone’s feet or hooves.

“Oh, please, Mr. I-Have-Never-Been-To-A-Mall,” she said crossing her arms. Her wings twitched slightly trying to move under the jacket that she had crammed them under.

“You’ve never been to a mall!” Lance exclaimed hitting the table that in turn caused the trays and cups the rattle and clink together.

“Well, it wasn’t like there was one to go to at the Garrison. Or in the middle of the desert.”

“Fair point,” acknowledged Pidge.

“And like you’re one to talk, Pidge. You’d gripe and moan the second we needed to go shopping,” Matt said with a laugh.

“Actually, Keith and Pidge came in second. Matt and Shiro got the least and the least practical of the items. With that being said, I believe that we can head back to the ship.”

“Ha ha! Good luck getting all those alien stains out, Matt.”

“It will be my pleasure,” Matt faked, “Actually, Allura, I think there is something else that we need and before you say no, call it my treat.”

“And what’s that?” Lance asked.

“I think we all could use some clothes. Nothing flashy, just the essentials. You too, Allura and Coran. Get yourself something.”

At this point, it would probably be helpful to explain what the paladins were wearing. Hunk had kept his usual clothes including the boots that he had instead on wearing. His feet were now more animalistic and shouldn’t have fit. Wearing boots made his feet hurt and he would probably have a few blisters by the end of the day, but he had decided that it was an unavoidable evil unless he wanted everyone to see his feet. Lance had on only his shirt and jacket. He had been a little self-conscious about not wearing pants but had talked himself out of it using logic like, well it’s not like I can wear them anyway. Keith was in the same boat. Matt had on his normal clothes. His pant fabric rubbed annoyingly up against his fur. It was rather itchy but he would rather keep them on. Pidge had worn the same clothes as normal but with the addition of a grey jacket she had asked Allura for over her wings. She didn’t exactly like having them there so cramming them away sounded like an ok option as uncomfortable as it was. Shiro hadn’t made any attempt to hide anything for the sole reason of it wouldn’t work. He couldn’t cram his wings, tail, horns, feet or any of it away.

“Matt, that’s very generous of you, but I don’t think we can accept,” Shiro objected.

“Nonsense,” he objected, “Look at what you’re wearing.”

“It’s likely going to get expensive,” Coran said.

“I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, what else am I going to spend it on? Besides, do you even have other clothes?”

“Well thanks, Matt,” Hunk said, “Do you want us to partner up?”

“It would be wise to,” Allura said.

“Perhaps instead of using the tablet to pick partners, we could have those who would require the same clothes?” Coran suggested, “We could have Shiro and Pidge, Matt and Hunk, and Lance and Keith.”

“Good idea,” agreed Shiro, “We can get you some dresses if you want.” He remembered how she wore them when they had met before the Kerberos mission. He had gotten close to the Holt family in that time.

“Uh, I’m good,” she replied, “I don’t think I want any dresses.”

“Why not? I thought you used to wear them all the time?” Lance asked putting his arm on her head warily avoiding the small antlers poking out of her messy locks.

“First, get your arm off of me. Second, they’re not the most practical for space.”

“Allura wears them all the time,” he pointed out.

“And by no means are we saying that you should wear them to battle,” Allura smiled.

“Really the only reason I used to wear them was because of my mom.” Pidge managed out trying to make an excucse.

Matt nodded, now he understood. When he and his dad had left, it was only Katie with his mom. Now that she was gone too, his mom was all alone. They didn’t have any relatives that lived nearby and weren’t particularly close to any of their neighbors. Now she was alone. She didn’t even know that they were alive.

“Oh, same,” Hunk said, “My moms used to have fun dressing me up all kinds of weird clothes for holidays and birthdays and stuff like that.”

“I bet you looked very cute, Hunk,” Pidge smiled.

“I did.”

“Well, I’ll help you get all kinds of new cute clothes now,” Matt smiled.

“We will see you six back here in about two vargas then unless we radio you otherwise,” confirmed Coran.

 

So yet again, three pairs of Earthlings set off through the space mall.

“So, Shiro, where should we look first?” Pidge asked looking up at her draconic companion as they walked.

“I’m not sure. Did you see any stores that you wanted to go into when you were with Keith?”

“No, it all kind of looked the same. Did you see any with Matt?”

“Nope.”

“Well, then I guess it doesn’t really, matter. I mean, as long as we go somewhere where they sell clothes that will fit our tails and wings.”

“Yep, so how about…” Shiro stopped and turned in a circle. “That one?”

He pointed to a store tinted green with a woman and child with two large spikes sticking out of their backs walking in.

“Looks good enough to me.”

 

“So, Matt,” Hunk asked thumbing through a rack of clothes in the first store he and Matt had come across, “What’s your style?”

“I’m wearing a cape right now, Hunk,” Matt said smiling and pulling out a solid green shirt. “I don’t exactly have a style.” He flipped over the shirt to inspect it. Upon seeing neon orange stripes on the torso, he put it back on the rack.

“Fair point. Are you going to get pants?” Hunk also pulled out a shirt. This one was a creamy yellow with white cuffs and a collar. He smiled and held it up to himself. 

“Why wouldn’t I?” Matt asked holding a lavender button-up shirt.

“Well, I thought that maybe you wouldn’t want to. With the fur and all,” he explained pulling the shirt back and holding up a smaller size that looked better.

“Yeah, I debated that this morning, actually. I don’t know, it’s a little uncomfortable and itches. But won’t don wearing pants be a little weird to you guys? No offense, but I’ve really just met you. I typically wait until the second date.”

“Oh you’re just as bad as Lance, but that’s a fair point. I don’t think anyone will care too much,” he put his hand on Matt’s back, “You’re a satyr or faun, everything’s covered up by fur. I think pants are optional. You’re also wearing a long shirt. And both Lance and Keith aren’t wearing pants.”

“I don’t think they had much of a choice in that,” he laughed, “If I don’t wear pants, then you don’t need to wear shoes. I can see they hurt.”

“My feet look gross, man. Like a hobbit’s.”

“And I’ve got a tail. Hunk, we’ve all got weird stuff, and we’re all trying to deal with it. Besides, this way we’ll both be uncomfortable.”

“Fair deal,” Hunk smiled and clapped his back one last time before pulling away.

 

“Nice going, Keith,” Lance gripped, “You’ve gotten us lost.”

“I did not, you’re the one leading us,” he countered, “Besides, we didn’t know where we were going earlier, why does it matter?”

“Because we’re looking for the elevator! And you’re the only one who’s used it between the two of us.”

Lance had decided that, in order to optimize their search, they would go look on one of the upper levels and possibly work their way down.

“Look,” Keith said with an inhale, “We’ll find one. It doesn’t matter which one we use.”

“Yeah, but it would help to not be wandering aimlessly!” Lance threw his hands up stopping. “We need to ask for directions.”

“Ok, Lance, ask who?” Keith stopped and gestured with his hands around them. Most, if not all, the stores around had been closed and there was no living soul close by.

“Exactly! That’s my point, you’ve taken us down to the sketchy part of the mall. 

“That has not been your point and you know it!”

“Oh, whatever, it is now. We need to turn around!”

“You know what! Fine! How about you just lead?” he yelled back.

“Fine!”

Pidge held up a mint and pea green striped tank top. “Hey, Shiro? What do you think of this shirt?” She turned around and looked over at her leader.

They had decided not to get into the previous event until they were with everyone else. Once Shiro had snapped out of it, he seemed normal other than being little shaken up.

Shiro turned around holding grey long sleeve shirt. “It’s green, it works well.”

“Think it’s too bright?”

“Since when have you cared about fashion?”

“I don’t, I don’t want it to be too bright.”

“Don’t worry, it’s not. I think green is your color," he said with a smile.

 

Lance and Keith eventually found a shop that they could agree upon going into after only a mild amount of bickering.

Keith was slithering down an aisle flipping through different colored shirts. He held out a tank top with some alien writing on it. Again, he regretted not having any translation software on him. It was a dark grey with the text in a reddish purple. He threw it over an arm and continued looking.

Lance was a few aisles away holding up a grey shirt with lighter stripes and three quarter length sleeves. It’s a little dark, so I would need to layer it with something brighter, he thought, my jacket would also be too dark. Maybe they have something here that would work well. He thumbed through racks looking at jackets and the equivalent flannel to layer it with. Settling on a few blue and auqa ones, he went to go cheek on Keith. He felt bad for arguing with him earlier. Even if they didn’t see eye to eye some of the time, they still were teammates.

“Finding anything?” he asked clopping over and flipping through a nearby rack.

Keith looked up through his unruly dark hair. “Yes.”

“Good, do you want to try some of it on?” he pointed to what he assumed was a dressing room.

“Sure.”

 

“Hey, Hunk, how this?” Matt held up bright red and puke green shirt with a smile. “I think it matches my antlers.”

“Suits you!” Hunk said turning around from a rack of hats, bandanas, and other head accessories. He grabbed a wide-brimmed neon green and threw it on. “This?” He jokingly smiled as it flopped over his eyes.

“Perfect,” Matt laughed.

The two had been doing this for about a half an hour, picking up weird pieces of clothing, bringing it in the back to try on, and laughing their tails off.

"How 'bout this?" Hunk held high a frilly and lacey royal blue button up it for a prince. 

"Stunningly, absolutely you."

“Oh! Now that our ears are so big, we should all get them pierced and get matching earrings! They do that at malls right?” 

“Team bonding!”

“Tattoos would be even better!”

The aliens at the counter eyed the pair suspiciously and frowned. Who were these people? What planet were they even from? They didn’t look like any species they had ever seen. Nor did they look to even be the same species.

Hunk clapped Matt on the back and doubled over laughing, “Come, on, let’s actually look for something we like.”

“Yeah. Shiro will be pretty angry if don’t come back with anything.”

"Or if we come back with pierced furry ears."

"Or a killer tat."

 

“So, Shiro, would you ever want to use your wings?” Pidge asked adjusting her glasses as they walked out of a store with bags in hand. Shirts perfect for people with wings.

Alarm flashed in Shiro’s eyes. “I don’t know. I think it is important that we understand everything about our new bodies. Flying is likely going to be part of that. Why do you ask?”

“Well, I don’t know. I didn’t really want them in the first place, but they’re here now. Keith said that flying might be useful in a fight. But we can just fly in our lions. Right? And besides, wouldn’t we have to build up muscles in our backs to fly? And who would even teach us? Baby birds are just pushed out of their nests and know what to do, but I don’t think I can do that. And you’re a dragon, Shiro, we have no idea how those are even supposed to fly. Our bone structure doesn’t even exist on Earth. Unless flight instincts were included with all the others. But we don’t even know how to control those, I mean I haven’t, have you, Shiro?” What Pidge didn’t realize during her stress-induced monolog, was that Shiro had stopped walking. “Shiro?”

He did not seem to phased by Pidge talking to him. His eyes were fixed on a shop window filled with gems and jewels. They glittered and winked in every color imaginable. Plumes of grey smoke rose from his nostrils.

“Shiro? Shiro, what’s wrong?” Pidge walked back and stood next to him. Her ears perked up slightly. “What are you looking at? There’s nothing there, it’s just a jewelry store.”

A low growling sound emanated from the back of Shiro’s thought. It didn’t sound particularly aggressive, more like a warning for Pidge to not do something. His head whipped around to her, eyes wide. And glowing a soft purple color. Not just his irises, but his whole eye looked like smoke trapped beneath some kind of glass. Just orbs of greyed purple flowing in their sockets.

“Sh-Shiro?” Pidge’s ears fell and brushed the sides of her face.

He made another round of growling swishing his tail behind him. He turned back to the window.

“Are, are you drooling?” No answer back. “Shiro, what’s wrong with you?” Nothing again.

She tried to think about what was happening. They had just been walking, she hadn’t been watching him when they were talking, and then he started looking at that window. Full of jewelry. And gems. That’s when it hit her.

Shiro is a dragon now, she thought to herself, he wants to hoard shiny and sparkly things. Jewelry.

“This is his new instincts…”

She grabbed him and pulled, “Shiro, you need to cut it out. Get back from there.”

Shiro stumbled away from the shop window.

“Pidge?” Shiro blinked several times and shook his head. “What are you doing?”

Pidge sighed in relief and slumped over without removing her arms. Her wings shifted lower to the ground and closer to Shiro in an almost embrace.

“You were acting really weird. You wouldn’t stop looking at that jewelry. You weren’t answering me. You-your eyes they were… It-it was like something look over you."

Shiro’s wings went limp and he looked down at Keith. “Pidge-I, I’m so sorry. I-I don’t know what came over me.”

She looked back up at him returning to her full height. Shiro looked noticeably rattled, his mouth left agape with worry filling his eyes.

“Do you, why, why were you were…looking at them like that?”

“I think I wanted to eat them,” he sheepishly admitted biting his lip, “Or take them. Or hide them? I’m not sure.”

“Like a real dragon wanting to hoard.”

“Yeah.”

“We need to find everyone else. I think this strip is starting to put too much strain on us.

 

“Keith, we need to get back,” Lance said sticking his head into the changing room where Keith stood taking off a shirt. The store they were only had one changing room with a broken lock. Neither had cared too much given the fact they were only trying on shirts but had opted to take turns trying on about five to six at a time.

“What do you mean?” Keith’s eyes darted over to Lance. There was something off about them, but neither could tell what or said anything about it. “We should still have almost half a varga left, right?”

“Yeah, but were just radioed by Coran. He said we needed to get back ASAP.”

“Something must be wrong,” He grabbed his regular black shirt and crudely wrestled it over his head and past his mop of hair.

“Woah, Keith. Uh, mirror,” Lance had finally realized what was up with his eyes. From the time it had taken him to pull the shirt on, the change in Keith’s eyes had fully manifested itself.

“Lance now is not the time to talk about my hair. We need to get our stuff and pay. Something’s wrong. Coran wouldn’t be telling us to leave if everything was normal.” Keith gritted his teeth together and began balling up the clothes he planned to buy.

“No, buddy, it's your eyes.” Lance pointed and began to gather his items as well.

Keith swallowed and slowly twisted around to look at his face. His eyes stuck out starkly against the red mask of scales that grew on his forehead and the bridge of his nose. They glowed a faint pale reddish purple leaving no part white.

“Uhh…” he swallowed again, lifted a clawed hand to his eyelid, and pulled down. “Yeah, time to find everyone else.”

 

Matt and Hunk walked down an escalator and into a crowded plaza while sipping smoothies.

“So anywhere else we need to go?” Matt asked taking his straw out of his mouth.

“We could-“ their radio buzzed. “Hold that thought.”  
“Don’t you mean, ‘Holt that thought’?” Matt joked while Hunk handed him his smoothie and fished around for their radio.

“Hey, Coran,” Hunk said lifting the radio to his fuzzy ear. “Uh, huh. Oh? Oh.” His ears twitched and drooped slightly causing Matt to wince. “O-ok, we’re on our way.” He lowered the radio. “Hunk, something’s up with Shiro. We need to meet back up.”

“Did Coran say what?” Hunk asked worriedly.

“He said his instincts were going a bit nuts, but not much else. But whatever is happening, it sounds urgent.”

 

The team regrouped at the front entrance to the mall and went back to the castle. Shiro and Pidge explained what had happened after the excitement over Keith’s color changing eyes. Allura piloted the ship out into open empty space and everyone settled down into the lounge area to talk.

“Coran, do you have any idea what’s going on?” Shiro asked.

“I may actually,” he stood up from his seat to explain and folded his hands behind his back. “You bodies are likely just settling into their new forms. It is likely just as a result of hormones leveling out. It may be a sign of maturity for your new, ah species. Perhaps dragons only hoard, as you called it, once they reach a certain age as a part of their puberty. Or developmentally a naga’s eyes change much like a growth spurt in human development. There’s likely nothing wrong with you other than what we already know.  
“That being said, Shiro’s outburst could also be attributed to staying in human for too long. It could have caused a strain on him and required too much energy. It could have made him...snap if you will.”

“With this being said,” Allura said standing up as well, “Coran and I believe that we need to set some ground rules.”

“What do you mean, princess?” Lance asked.

“Well, I know that this situation is less than ideal, to say the least. And while we are going to go our best to reverse these changes, I think it would be wise to not do certain things. For example, we do not want you referring to yourself as the name of the animal that you are now, for lack of better word, mixed with. The same should go for calling other members of your team an animal. I’ve heard you do it and it will do nothing but make you feel worse. If you feel the need to use the name of the mythical creature you have been turned into, then that is fine. You are not an animal, and as such, will not be treated as one. Well, no more than you were before.”

“Next,” Coran chimed in, “Is to remember not to feel like this is your fault. You cannot help the fact that humans are susceptible to radiation. If anything, this is my fault for not realizing the high levels in the area before it was too late. If you do feel bad about this situation, please talk to either one of us, I insist.”

“As do I,” Allura continued, “The third rule is to not fight your new instincts.” Allura folded her hands in front of her. “They are perfectly natural for your new bodies. Many species have them, even humans. Fighting them would be trouble than it is worth. The only reason they are so suppressed in humans is due to generations of resistance to them. If you really need help with them, we are here to do so. No one is going to say anything rude or otherwise judge you about any actions done under the influence of your instincts. They are meant to be something to help you to survive. Possibly with some luck, they could be helpful in a fight or battle.”

“Now, while the others have been mental rules, this one is more physical. We don’t want you staining or testing the limits of your new bodies.” Lance coughed Keith’s name under his breath and got glared at. “This includes going too long with sleep, running too hard or too long, staying in a more human form for too long, or anything that may create any unnecessary strain on yourself. There will be opportunities that will naturally present themselves to do this in battle, but for now, we want you all to just get used to being like this before anything doing anything risky. Some of you will not fit into a healing pod that we currently have operational so until we have that as a backup, be careful.”

“Now that brings us to our next point. We would like to have you all train. Within the next few day, we will be going to a planet uninhabited by intelligent life forms. It will be mostly forests and will have areas that will allow you test out your abilities in a, somewhat, safe environment. Pidge and Shiro, Coran and I are looking to find a planet that has conditions that we can help you learn how to fly. We have a few in mind with atmospheric conditions that would be ideal.”

“I think that training sounds like a great idea,” Shiro smiled.

“What would be ideal conditions?” Pidge asked curiously.

“Planets with less gravity or air that makes you feel lighter just to build up good flight habits before flying Earth-like conditions.”

“Now, of course, this list is flexible as you progress and can be added to if we something else unhealthy. And if you do add to it, you must have a reason.”

“I will post these rules in the control deck should you need a reminder,” Coran smiled.

“Coran and I want to make this time as easy as possible for each of you. If you need anything, no matter how small, it could just help scratching a part of your back you can’t reach, or preening feathers, or a rock in a hoof, or help brushing, or bathing even, please ask. Don’t try to endure this on your own.”

“Or ask each other if you do not feel comfortable asking one of us.”

“While we may not understand what any of this is like, we want to help. Whether it be having someone to talk to or just making this more comfortable. We are going to do all that we can to fix this, but we don’t know how long it’s going to take, or if we even can.”

“Until then,” Coran perked up, “who knows, you may even find yourself enjoying these new changes.”

“You know what,” Lance said smiling sheepishly, “I think I will take you up on that back scratch. I've had this itch all day.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this one took me longer than normal for a few reasons including the length of it, and a few weird personal issues that I've been dealing with. Like dealing-with-a-new-"possibly life-threatening"-medical-issue-that-I've-supposedly-had-for-almost-a-year kind of weird. But don't worry! I'll be fine and I'll still update this!  
> But lordy was this one long! Single space in font 12 it wound up being 19 pages long! Also, with the (little) free time that I have, and when I'm not writing or editing this, I have been drawing fanart and editing/retracing pictures of the characters for this AU! I'm trying to figure out the best way to upload them so that you guys will be able to view them easiest/conveniently. If you have any suggestions, let me know!  
> Anyways, enjoy and have a nice day/week/however long it takes for me to update this! And as always thanks for reading!

After the shopping trip, the castle’s menu got a significant upgrade. Instead of just green food goop, there were now hot steaming plates of meat and vegetables, fruit for breakfast, quick and easy to make entrees for when neither Coran nor Hunk wanted to cook, and of course, Earth snacks. Although Allura and Coran did not get brain freezes, they were highly sensitive to spicy foods. The first time Coran ate one of the rolled up bits of corn chip covered in red-hot dust, Pidge thought she saw smoke pouring out of his ears. It was better for the two Alteans to stick to the more potato-based snacks like chips or the sweeter candies like chocolate.

It was a good thing that they had stocked up on so much food. With the increased body mass of the paladins, they required more fuel in order to function as normal. Shiro and Pidge ate an exponential amount of extra food. Shifting between a humanoid form and their so-called monster forms required a lot of effort. Both had learned the hard way that staying human for too long drained their energy and made them “run out of batteries” as Hunk had put it.

They had been in the middle of a mental training exercise when Shiro had collapsed and promptly became covered in scales and grew many times his original size. Lance had rushed off to get Coran while Hunk, Keith, and Pidge attempted to do their best in the meantime. Shiro was too tired to speak to anyone or even try to make a growl. By the time Allura, Coran, and Matt had arrived, he was out cold and even snoring. When he woke several vargas later, he explained that he had been tired due to having difficulty falling asleep the previous night. Coran instructed him to get a snack and take it easy for the rest of the day.

Pidge had resisted shifting in favor of her humanoid form. Being a deer was nothing but a pain, if she just stopped shifting and forced her body to pick one form, it would be for the best. Wouldn’t it? So she tried it for two days, no shifting. To ensure that this would happen, she didn’t sleep either. She had been talking with Lance and Hunk in the kitchen when her face went blank mid-sentence and she fell off the counter she was sitting on. Coran prescribed her too with a snack and bed rest. After of course a scolding on the importance of not running your body into the ground.

The collapses continued until Matt, tired of seeing the people he cared about taking so little care of themselves, added a new rule to the list: You have to shift at some point during the day and take a break from your humanoid form. Pidge and Shiro had many objections to this at first, but soon gave in and later realized that it was a good idea.

It had probably been about a week, and aside from the sporadic shifting, things were relatively uneventful. There was one distress beacon that they picked up but were able to notify The Blade of Marmora of the situation and how they felt that they were not properly equipped to handle the situation at the present time. The nearby base took care of it with ease and passed the message of the paladin’s situation on to their higher-ups until the whole organization knew. Keith latter received a transmission asking if he wished to continue with his missions, the answer was yes. This also prompted Matt to notify the rebel forces of the situation as well, just so that everyone was on the same page. He also got transmissions for clarification, but also one asking if he was ok, and the other from Olia asking if he was with his little sister that he had spoken so much about.

Allura eventually got restless with not being able to use her team to fight the empire.

“Good evening, paladins,” she spoke as one by one everyone filed into the kitchen for dinner. “You know how we discussed going to a habitable planet for some on world training?”

“Yeah?” Lance said around a bite of the discolored pizza Hunk had made.

“Tomorrow is that day. I expect you all up early and be ready to go,” she said sternly.

“That sounds wonderful, Allura. What are the conditions on this planet?” Shiro asked.

“Thetnis’ atmosphere is thick with, what do you call them… greenhouse gasses. However, because of its distance from its star, they help to trap in the heat and regulate the planet’s temperature. It is a humid and warm planet and water falls from the sky most of the year in a very similar fashion to the rain that Lance has described. This, unfortunately, leads to large electrical storms unparalleled to the one we had on Altea. However, they may be mild compared to the ones on your Earth. Not to worry, as it does not appear to have one coming anytime soon.

“There is one large, deep, circular ocean, and one that spans across the equator. We will not be visiting these due to dangerous life that lives it; however, we can visit one of the many lakes and ponds or wetlands that are scattered across the planet.

“It does not have any intelligent life forms and is mostly populated by small mammals and reptiles. Animals that are not flightless are rare and most of the vegetation consists of shrubs, flowers, or small trees. It does not have seasons, but even if it did, we would not be there long enough to experience them. We will be there for three of its days at most.”

“Wait, princess, three days? We don’t have that much time,” Shiro said his tail flicking over and wing twitching slightly. He had been trying to refrain from letting his body make the bizarre and foreign movements.

“I’m sorry,” Allura clarified, “I forgot to mention that Thetnis has a fast rotation on its axis causing it to have short days and bands in its atmosphere. It is a beautiful planet from orbit.”

“Oh, like Jupiter,” Hunk said remembering the reddish cream stripes and orange storms that pocked the great planet.

“I’m assuming yes? Now, I know the planet does not have the most ideal of conditions, but it is the closest habitable planet that we know of not under the empire’s control. ”

“But before tomorrow,” Coran said, “I would like more data-” Everyone groaned. Matt hit his head on the table. “Oh stop that now, it’s not that bad.”

“It’s boring sitting for that long,” complained Lance.

“Yes, but I need to know if you’re still radioactive and if your DNA has changed and how your vision has improved or gotten worse. It’s all standard stuff. Well, as standard it gets for this situation I suppose.”

“Listen to Coran,” Shiro said, “Think about it like a normal doctor’s appointment.”

Keith glared down at his tail, “Sure. Normal.”

About half a varga later, everyone was making their way to the medbay for another night of testing. Coran took samples of their hair, skin, fur, and scales for DNA, both in human and monster form for Shiro and Pidge, while they wore heart rate monitors to make sure their hearts were still working fine. They were. Then he checked to see if anyone still had remaining radioactivity from the original transformation. The equivalent of a Giger counter beeped a few times before deciding that they were at a stable level that shouldn’t be harmful to anyone unless they were a human.

After they had finished, Coran led them into a new plainly furnished room with only a computer mounted on a desk, a chair in the back center of the room and a small square screen across from it.

“Eye exam time!” Coran declared walking over to the computer and pulling up an eye chart.

“Coran, we can’t read Altean,” Hunk pointed out looking at the alien glyphs.

“Ah, sorry, allow me to fix that,” he apologized walking over to a computer and clicking a few buttons to run a translation software. It loaded and became the alphabet. “Ah, there we are, human.”

“Coran, you can’t read ‘human’,” Lance pointed out with air quotes.

“Right! Forgot! Funny how that works isn’t it? Someone else can just mark down what the person reading get wrong, and how far off they were, and I can go from there,” he decided, “Let’s go in alphabetical order by last name then. Hunk you’re up first!”

“I’ll help translate,” Shiro said, “The rest of you can wait outside if you want.”

The others nodded and left the room.

Hunk stat down in the chair and Coran handed him a black spoon-shaped object for him to hold over his eye. He read off the cart with Shiro writing down the few errors he made. With that, Hunk was done.

“I’m mildly nearsighted, so not much change there,” he declared walking out, “Your turn Pidge.”

Pidge sat in the chair with some difficulty from her wings and went through the same procedure after she took off her wire-framed lenses.

“Ah, Pidge?” Shiro asked after she couldn’t read the seventh line down at all and made errors nearly every other letter on the other lines, “When-how-why…?” he paused, “When you got your eye exam at the Garrison, what did they say your prescription was?”

“They didn’t. My eyesight never was bad enough to warrant corrective lenses,” she explained.

“But, you’ve been wearing Matt’s old glasses…”

“Yep.”

“24/7.”

“Yep.”

“And your eyes have gotten used to them haven’t they?” asked Coran.

“Yep.”

Shiro sighed, “Alright, let’s just keep going.”

With the baseline in place, Coran tapped more buttons on the computer and a panel opened from the ceiling. From it lowered a phoropter, much sleeker and high-tech than the ones on Earth. Coran slid it in place over Pidge’s face. It made a few clicking, whirring noises before it dinged, and a blue light on the side blinked a few times. Coran clicked a button on the side and different sets of internal lenses slid together.

“Alrighty!” he announced, “Try that line again, Pidge. Your eyes have been scanned and the lenses you are looking through right now should be the right ones. May I see your brother’s pair just to see what you’ve been using?”

Pidge handed Coran her glasses and he left to go scan them for their strength while Shiro marked for Pidge.

“These are a bit too strong,” Coran said once he finished and returned, “Would you like to replace the lenses?”

“Talk to Matt,” Pidge said, “Make sure he’s ok with.”

Matt came into the room for his exam and to discuss the glasses. His vision was perfectly fine from the Lasik surgery the Garrison gave him. When asked about the glasses, he said he was fine with replacing the lenses.

Next came Keith, nothing wrong with his vision, in fact, it had improved. The reddish purple tint was still very much there. It had been unnerving for Keith to look at every time he looked in a mirror.

Lance’s vision had gotten a little worse, but Coran said it wouldn’t be noticeable and that they shouldn’t worry about it unless it truly began to bother him.

Pidge volunteered to mark what Shiro got wrong for the sole reason that she was curious about what his vision was like. His eyes, as it turned out, were amazing. He had always possessed perfect vision, but it was incredible now. Coran kept making the letters smaller and smaller until they were as small as they could get, but it still looked clear.  
Coran ushered the group back to the main medical area and explained the results, “Everyone’s eyes look relatively normal. Hunk and Keith, yours look more trained for night vision, however, this should not be much of an issue. It will actually prove itself useful I believe.

“Shiro, your new improvements will be helpful when flying, and Pidge, I believe your eyes improved themselves, but could not do it full to the full extent like due to your vision being imperfect, unlike Shiro who already had great vision to begin with.

“Lance and Matt, I don’t think anything happened to your eyes except for being able to reflect light.”

Shiro, upon seeing that they were done for the day, instructed everyone to head to bed or to at least start settling down for the evening.

Lance decided to put on a facemask and relax with headphones on. Keith, much to his dismay, was not allowed to train, so instead, he focused on cleaning his knife and bayard. Pidge and Matt decided to hang out and help Hunk with making peanut butter cookies. Coran was performing DNA tests and Allura had settled into her room with a book. Shiro was satisfied, although he could not place exactly why, that everyone was safe. It seemed normal, he was always looking after his team. He of all people knew how dangerous things could be out here, but this felt… different somehow. It felt like something just below the skin had woken up and was now stirring and writhing around. He didn’t have the right word for the sensations and the emotion that came with it, but it was stronger than a gut feeling. Much more deep-rooted and almost primal. He’d been feeling it for a while and didn’t know how to stop it yet.

 

Allura came in halfway through Coran’s testing to make sure things were running smoothly.

“Hello, Coran,” she said comfortably switching into the two’s native language of Altean. Although the Lions could translate, Alteans were excellent with languages. When the paladins first arrived, their brains were quickly able to process and memorize the Human’s language. Now they were fluent with the translators picking up whatever gaps arose, so they spoke Human around everyone else, and Altean around each other.

“Hello, princess. How may I be of assistance?” Coran asked turning around from his worktable with a pair of goggles that made his eyes look too big on.

“I was just coming to see how everything was going,” she explained taking a seat.  
Coran frowned and pulled the goggles from off his face, hanging them around his neck instead. “You’re worried aren’t you?”  
Allura sighed, “Yes. I suppose I am.” She rested her elbows on her knees with her head on her folded hands. “I’m not sure what I should do. Clearly, the paladins are not in the right state to be fighting but were losing so much of what we have worked so hard for.

“And while I know that the Blade of Marmora and our other allies are doing all that they can, I can’t help but feel like this is irresponsible of us. Us taking this much time, the time we already do not have, for us to sort through this. So many of lost their lives and I can’t help but feel responsible. I don’t want this to be what people remember, in the universe’s darkest hour of need, we abandoned it. Like we didn’t care.

“Not to mention how worried I am about the paladins. They’ve become our closest friends and it hurts me to see them like this. I don’t know how to help. I feel so useless, yet so responsible. Coran, what do you think I should do? What should we do?” Allura shut her eyes.

Coran smiled, “Allura,” he walked over and ran his hand through her hair and a comforting way, “as your royal advisor, it is my professional opinion that you should get some rest.”

“Yes I-What?” her eyes flew open and she gave him a quizzical look.

“Worrying will do you no good, not this kind at least. You carry such a heavy burden on yourself, what I wouldn’t give to see it lifted away. You already do so much for everyone around you, whether they know it or not. The universe is going to remember you a fighter, as someone who cared, as the woman who let lifetimes pass, only to get stronger, as a toppler of an empire. Taking a little to get into a better state will not be the thing that gets you.” He sat down next to her and his eyes swept the room as he sighed. “Do you remember when you cut your knee falling off your first hoverbike? You were only six then.”

She laughed sadly whipping tears from her eyes. “I do. I wouldn’t take the bandage. I said I didn’t need it, but you wouldn’t let me leave without one.” She sniffed. “You searched the whole castle up and down for an orange one because I refused all other colors.”

“Yes, I did. Allura, you have always meant so much to me, and you always will, now more than ever. Get some sleep. Tomorrow the Earthlings are going out. They will be fine without you. Take the day off. Please. Everything will go fine.”

“Well, I-I suppose I could,” she pondered.

“No, you don’t suppose, you will and are going to. I’ll see to it that the paladins fulfill their duties.” He kissed her on the forehead, “Go get some sleep, you’re overdue.”  
Allura stood up and hugged Coran. “Thank you.” She walked out of the lab and to her bedroom where she got ready to go to sleep.

Coran stayed up until the tests were complete and at last a varga after to analyze them. The results were...concerning, to say the least. They weren’t one thing or another. Not quite human, but not entirely separate. It still looked like DNA from Earth, which was not all too different from DNA from Altea.

Keith’s DNA, per usual, baffled Coran, with the Galra genes clashing with the human ones, his DNA was unlike anything he’d ever seen. The new addition of snake was not helping. Different parts of Lance and Matt were not the same. The samples of fur from their legs did not look to be from the same organism as the skin samples from their upper halves.

Their hair, however, seemed to be a blend of the two. Hunk’s seemed to be a perfect mixture, never exactly human, but not quite something else. Coran assumed that the different components that the DNA was mixed with were the genetic codes of whatever animal that had become part of them. Shiro and Pidge’s DNA had no remains of human left. 100% dragon and preyton no matter which form they were in. They only looked somewhat human when they shifted. Just like in Matt, Keith, and Lance’s DNA, samples taken from different places on Pidge were not the same. The feather DNA had a distinct difference than her fur.

Coran’s stomach dropped looking at the results. This wasn’t good, their genetic code was completely rewritten. The expert hybridization that their DNA demonstrated was rarely achieved, even with immense luck. Not to mention that the temperature it would take to break down the hydrogen bonds that held the DNA together for it would have severely burned the Earthlings at the least, and caused their internal organs to cease functioning at the most. Even the kind of blending that occurred would have needed to be performed before they were born. To have it happen, and so smoothly and quickly, at such a late stage in development was impossible. It was a miracle they were alive, that their bodies had survived the process, that they weren’t in a coma, that they were functioning and walking and moving and still even had bodies to speak of. That they were still the same people at all.

Coran stood up from his worktable and pushed in his chair. He cleaned up, putting the samples and results away for safe keeping and turned out the lights making his way to bed himself.

The next morning, the paladins ate their breakfasts as Coran explained the results of his DNA testing. Pidge was deeply disturbed by no longer having human in her. Tablets were passed around the table with comparisons showing that no one’s genetic code looked the same. Questions were asked and answered by all. Coran did his best to keep everyone from freaking out. Lance felt violated and his skin crawled off his bones. Hunk fidgeted with the hem of his shirt feeling like he was going to be sick and going to scream at once. Keith inhaled sharply at the data and closed his eyes steadying himself. Matt tapped his largest finger slowly and felt like he was going to cry. Shiro just swallowed and kept up a strong façade while looking at the scales on his hand. All were normal reactions to hearing that your blueprints, the thing that makes you yourself, is now ripped and torn apart, destroyed and twisted into a new and bizarre shape.

Allura stood up and addressed the team, “Earth-“ she stopped herself. Don’t use that word, she thought, it will make it worse. “Everyone, I want to remind you that this does not change anything. You are still yourself. You are still Keith Kogane, Lance McClain, Hunk Garret, Katie Holt, Mathew Holt, and Takashi Shirogane. This should not change the way you think about yourself or any of your teammates. Right, Coran?”

“Correct, princess, in fact, that should be a new rule. You are not defined by your DNA results.”

“Precisely, now I think it would be best to get on with the day. Meet me on the main bridge in half a varga.”

Right on time, everyone arrived for their final briefing about the planet. Lance wore a dark blue shirt layered with a grey and black flannel. Hunk donned a creamy yellow shirt with a green trim on the sleeves and collar. He paired it with grey shorts with many pockets and a hole for his tail. Pidge had selected a light and dark green striped tank top with comfortably sized holes for her wings and a pair of shorts. Keith also wore a tank top, but his was black with purple-red writing that roughly translated to “I can’t hear you”. Matt had an orange and navy blue shirt with white accents on, and as promised, no pants. Other than Pidge making a joke about it, no one had bothered him about it. Shiro wore a dark grey t-shirt with a lightweight black and white jacket over it. Everyone kept their weapon in its compacted version clipped to their side just in case.

“The weather for today on planet Thetnis is, per usual, cloudy and raining. There is also a layer of fog,” Allura said arms folded across her waist. “This just further enforces the fact that you are required to wear your trackers and radios, and have you pack with you at all times.”

Behind her, just outside the window was the arching horizon of a blue planet. Where Earth was blue from its oceans, this planet was a marble hung in the sky. Shades ranging from cobalt at the poles to powder at the tropics to lapis and slate. Pocked with cream, teal, cerulean and grey storms. Rapid flashes of white lighting forked in the far distance.  
“However,” she continued, “We did not anticipate this amount of violent weather. It does appear to be localized to one place if you are ok with it.”

Lance grinned wide, “It shouldn’t be a problem at all! We love violent weather! Right, guys?”

“Nope,” agreed Hunk.

“Always love a good storm,” Pidge smiled.

“Splendid, Coran and I shall be in the castle should you need anything. There is some fog, but the lights will be on in case you have any trouble finding us. We again are insisting that you will partner up and will go in the following teams and will work on the following skills: Pidge and Matt, work on any deer-related instincts and activities that you are aware of. Keith and Hunk: further control of you upgraded scene of smell and response time, we recommend hunting for this. And Lance and Shiro, you will improve your running and agility. We need to know if the skills you previously possessed and utilized on missions are still there, or if they need to be relearned. Lance and Matt, you will need to carry the pack for your partners. It may get in the way of Shiro and Pidge’s wings causing discomfort and possible injury. Hunk and Keith, you may sort out who will carry it between yourselves. ” Allura drew in a new breath and took on an even more stern tone, “We cannot allow ourselves to forget that we are still at war, and as such are training for it. This is just a detour on the road to victory.”

“You’re a monster now! So go and train like one!” Coran confirmed winding the end of his mustache with a hand on his hip.

Everyone nodded and began the trek down to the exit as Allura guided the ship through the thick and turbulent atmosphere.

“You ready, Pidge?” Matt asked readjusting the backpack with the radios, water bottles and pouches, and some snacks.

“Might as well be. Can’t say I like doing this,” she responded as she shifted and flapped her stiff wings  
“What’s the alternative? Pretend that we’re human?” He unclipped his staff and flipped it outward. Orange lights flared as it expanded and faded as the internal mechanisms clicked into place. Matt swung it back to his side and proceeded to use it as a walking stick.

Lace shuddered and whispered over to Hunk, “I hate it when they do that.”

“Do what?” he asked retying his headband and the ship swayed in the decent.

“Talking like a deer. It’s weird, and I know Pidge can’t help it, and it’s not so weird when she does it, but Matt understanding her. It feels kinda weird. But I guess he can’t help having those ears wired into his brain and understanding Pidge like that is a good thing.”

Matt’s ears twitched on cue and swiveled around at the mention of his name. He laughed and turned around, “Yeah and there’s another perk to having them besides knowing what my sisters saying. Hearing everything said about me.”

“Oh come on, man. That’s not even fair,” he complained throwing his hands out.

Another gust of wind shook the ship. Causing Hunk to grab hold to Lance and Matt to accidentally prop himself up on Pidge’s head and hitting her antlers.

“I’d bet you’ve got do pretty good hearing too,” Pidge said once Allura leveled the ship. She huffed at the blank stares looking for Matt to translate.

“Oh! She’s pointing out how you probably have good hearing now with those new ears.”

Lance’s ear twitched in response. “Sure.”

“I think she’s serious,” Hunk said.

“And I seriously doubt I do,” Lance frowned deeper.

Pidge raised her wing and thumped his side with it. “Just be glad you’ve got something human still in your genetic code, Lance.”

The ship rocked slightly with the telltale signs of touching down on the surface of a planet. A newfound energy crackled its way through the six alien explorers as the hatch in front of them opened.

And were then promptly blasted with hot wind, rain, mist and a layer of fog.

Lance grinned wildly and ran out onto the drenched grass screaming for joy. “Rain! Actual rain!”

Shiro, who had been walking with Keith a short distance behind, stood in front of everyone. “Alright, everyone, Allura told us what we should be working on, split up and remember to work together. This isn’t just today’s training exercise, this is also a bonding exercise. They may be basic but humans first came together, like wolves, with pack bonds. You have your radios, weapons, and backpacks with food and medical supplies if you need it. Good luck, and when in doubt, give into your instincts. We need to know how they work, and for now, the best thing we can do is get experience with having them.”

Keith nodded, “Got it.”

Shiro shifted after he and Lance had disappeared into the semi-thick fog.

The dragon had been making an effort to check up on the wellbeing of his team to see what their feelings on the present situation were. So far he’d had the opportunity to talk to Hunk and Keith, the ladder had been rather tight-lipped, while the former expressed a sort of excitement and curiosity although still being hesitant and a bit afraid of what happened to everyone.

“Are you sure you’re ok, Lance? I want to make sure everything’s ok considering… well, everything.” He lifted his wing over Lance as both a crude umbrella and a protective gesture.

Lance looked over to the reptile and blinked twice before saying, “It’s ok, Shiro, I like the rain the rain, you don’t need to block it!” he protested pushing up on the grey membrane until he folded his wing back. Shiro still had an expectant look on his face.

“Were you saying something else?”

“I-uh…oh. Dragon, right.” He stopped walking and closed his eyes taking deep breaths. Once he felt the revealing tingling and pins and needles feelings, he recognized he was in his humanoid form and reopened his eyes.

“Sorry about that, Lance. I just get comfortable as a dragon and forget no one can understand what I’m saying. I was just making sure you were ok. I know you’ve been having difficulties with adjusting to everything.” He continued walking alongside Lance.

“Oh, yeah, that’s got to be a pain.”

“Little bit. I’ve also noticed that the longer I go without shifting, not only do I feel more tired, I also start to grow more scales and my new instincts begin to flare up. But you don’t want to hear about that, how are you holding up?”

“Decent I suppose. Dealing with everything has been hard. While I get everyone is dealing with weird things because of the animals they’ve been mixed with, I can’t help but feel like I’ve been given the short end of the stick. Everyones has been turned into these actually cool things. Keith has the strength of like five people, Hunk can see in the dark, Matt has really good hearing now and Pidge is a deer with wings, plus the both of them could take an eye out with those antlers. And then you. You’re a dragon for crying out loud! You can breathe fire and pretty soon you’ll be able to fly! But what am I? A stupid horse. I can’t do any of the awesome things that you guys can.”

Shiro stopped walking and put his arm on Lance’s shoulder. “That’s not true, Lance. You offer so much to the team. We can’t do all the amazing things you as a person, not a monster, can. And remember rule one, you’re a centaur, not just a horse.”

“I know about the skills I have, I’m not worried about that. I just don’t think what I’ve been turned into is fair.”

Shiro thought for a moment, “True, this situation isn’t fair. And you may have gotten the short end of the stick. And I know you’ve heard the saying about how life isn’t either, it’s true too. I of all people should know,” he raised his robotic arm, “But the thing is, it doesn’t need to be. As long as you do your best, and have people to help you, everything will be fine. And yeah, this sucks. It totally does. I’m not going to tell you you’ll like being like this or pretend like everything is fine, but, Lance, just know that you’re not going through this on your own. No matter what happens, no matter what the universe throws at us, no matter what we get turned into, we’re a team, and we’ll stick together.”

Lance smiled, “I bet this isn’t what you had in mind when you signed up for the Kerberos mission.”

“No, Lance,” he replied shrugging and spreading his arms and shaking his head, “No it really wasn’t.”

 

Matt squinted into the fog in front of him and Pidge.

“So wait, what exactly did you see?” she asked looking up at him.

“Shhh.”

As they had been walking, he could have sworn something had ran in front of them. While he hadn’t been able to make it out, it had been large and probably bipedal. Pidge hadn’t seen it and as such, was skeptical of what he said he saw.

“I seriously doubt that there’s anything out there, Matt.”

Something sounded, like the movement of a bush or, no, that wasn’t right, it was more the sound of ripping paper. _Riiiipp_.

They froze.

“Shift,” he told her. He held his weapon in front of him. The orange glow reflected off the silver fog.

“What?”

“I said shift.”

Pidge closed her eyes and pictured herself in her more humanoid form. The sound wrinkled through the air again. Pidge’s eyes flew open and she frantically scanned the gloom. She couldn’t see anything other than her brother and the fact that she hadn’t successfully shifted. That sent a panic through her. She squeezed her eyes shut again and took deep breaths. Human, human, human. Two legs, not four. There was that sound again, _riiiipp_. She reopened her eyes. Still in monster form. Alarm clawed at her stomach and tore its way up into her throat. This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t happening!

“Matt, Matt I can’t shift!” She harshly whispered, eyes darting up into Matt’s.

He froze in place and his eyes widened. “Can you not focus on it? Or do you not have enough energy to?”  
“I don’t know.”

“Ok. Pidge I need you to try. Don’t think about what’s around us, don’t think about the sound, forget that I’m even here. Just think about shifting.”  
She closed her eyes and did as he instructed. After almost half a dobosh later, she felt the tingling pricking sensation of floating. Pidge reopened her eyes expectantly. Nothing.  
“You almost had it. You had started changing shape, but you stopped too soon I think,” he said throwing his head back to the area of the sound.

She nodded, swallowed and closed her eyes. Pidge swam in the silky black behind her eyelids thinking only about being human. Not about the warm air clinging and condensing to her fur, not about the ominous ripping, not about her brother’s concern. Just about the way it felt to run, the push and pull of muscles, the unruly hair that grew from her scalp and how it hurt to fight the tangles in it.

She was unaware how much time had passed while she had spent in thought when a four-fingered hand was placed on her shoulder causing her to jump up and flap her wings.

And make a bleating sound.

She slapped her hand over her mouth and their eyes locked in horror.

“What. Was. That.” She annunciated.

“I think you just…bleated.”  
Pidge swallowed, her saliva feeling tick in her mouth, her tongue taking you too much room.

“Get out your bayard. We can talk about this after we know what’s coming.”

She nodded and slid the weapon out as it transformed in her hand.

The sound resonated again, shorter and, as Matt had said, closer.

Pidge unfurled her wings around her and brought them high above her head. Feathers splayed out and occupied the empty space around her making Pidge appear much larger than the small girl was.

Matt recognized what she was doing, even if he was unaware if it was intentional, from a nature documentary their family watched together. It was a form of mimicry used by some birds to intimidate other animals whether it was predators or to fight over a mate. Smart, he thought steadying his breath as it condensed in the air.

Their ears swiveled toward the source of the sound listening intently.

The noise sounded again, and again, and again until they could hear it directly in front of them.

“Whatever it is, I want you to make as much noise as you can to try and scare it off. Ok?”

Pidge nodded and spread out her wing so wide it began to hurt.

The sound came one last time before a silhouette appeared. It was small and squat, nothing like what Matt had described. Finally, it took its last leap and landed on their side of the vapor.

“Really?” Pidge accused, “A space rabbit? You survive alien capture, bounty hunters, and how ever you got that scar on your face, to be scared of a space rabbit. Really?” She briskly lowered her wings and smacked him with one on accident.

Matt grabbed her feathers and pushed them out of his face getting a better look at the multicolored, wide-eyed, long-eared creature that sat in front of them. It, unlike actual rabbits, had a long sweeping tail with a collection of silver and pink striped rounded spines that dragged on the ground behind it. It hopped forward, despite the pair of much larger creatures that stood between it, to where ever it was going. As its tail dragged, the spines rattled together and created the sound they had been plagued with. _Riiiipp_.

“Wh-wha-no. That’s not what I saw earlier. The thing I saw with huge compared to that thing. It was at least the size of one of us.”

“This is just like the time you swore up and down you saw a Thunderbird behind our house.”

“But I-I wasn’t. I” he sighed, “I saw something.” He looking at her eyes as round as saucers, “Both times, Pidge.”

“You seriously thought you saw something? You’re not joking or messing with me?” she asked worriedly biting her lip. He wouldn’t have gotten that freaked out if he was, she thought, he’s not that good an actor.

“No, there was… something out there,” Matt held with his tail and ears flicking around wildly. His wet nose scrunched up and his nostrils flared sporadically. He was looking for something using his new traits, even if it was just his instincts acting independently.

Matt and Pidge pivoted to watch as the shape of the animal receded into the haze on its way.

“So, the ah…the sound I made…” Pidge offered as a subject change.

“Yeah uh...you wanna call Coran about that?” he asked.

“Kinda.” She bit her lip.

He shrugged off the backpack and unzipped the pouch with radio.

He tapped the buttons a few times before it put it on the speaker option. He had some difficulty due to his index/middle finger being so large compared to the keys.  
It beeped meaning it was ready for the users to speak.

“Coran?” Matt asked for confirmation.

“H-Hello?” asked a rather confused-sounding Allura. “Who is this?”

“Oh!” Matt cleared his throat, “Hey, Allura. It’s Matt and Pidge. Sorry to bug you, but Pidge just did something weird and we were trying to call Coran. Can you take the radio to him?”

“What happened?” She shifted her weight and they could hear the sound of water sloshing from the other end. “You’re not in danger are you?”

“No, no, no, Pidge just uh…do you want to explain?”

“I just made a deer noise, and I’m a little freaked out.”

“Oh, my! Would you excuse me for a moment?”

“Sure.” More water rushing.

“Is she in the bath?” Pidge mouthed. Matt just shrugged and shook his head, how should I know?

“Coran!” Allura yelled distantly. She had walked away from her radio.

They listened to Allura’s side of the conversation.

“No, Coran! Pidge and Matt!” “No, I said Pidge and Matt.” “Well, I don’t know if they’re at a lake!” “Why would they be doing that?” “I doubt it.” “But-” “Coran!” Allura stomped off and came back with the ginger man.

“Now, sorry for the confusion,” he apologized, “I was in the middle of making tonight’s dinner out of the vaigaria roots and shlekiner that Lance and Hunk picked up. Now, what seems to be the problem?”

Pidge could picture the kitchen a mess with stacked off-kilter dirty batter caked bowls, pots, and pans. Hunk would likely have his head if he didn’t properly clean the space.  
“Well, Pidge made a deer sound called a bleat. It was unintentional and I accidentally scared her, causing her to make the sound.”  
“Oh, well, that doesn’t sound so bad.” They heard him readjust his position. “You all have been having some weird quirks; a new vocalization doesn’t appear to be beyond the new realm of the normal.”

“Yeah, but before that, I had trouble shifting. I’m worried the two are connected,” explained Pidge her wings giving in involuntary twitch.

“Oh…” Coran contemplated, “Well, it could… Hmm…If-no-no, that wouldn’t account for…Well! You have officially stumped me!” Matt locked eyes with Pidge at Coran’s declaration. You would hope the person in charge of your medical status would have a decent idea of what was happening to you. “Let me ask you this? Have you had any of the symptoms that we chocked up to your hormones settling like the others have?”

“Other than having more control over my ears and tail, no,” she pondered, “I’ve had less control over my wings too.”

“Ah, making these sounds may become an ordinary occurrence for you now. You are younger than the others and as such may have needed more time. Or it may be that everyone will demonstrate this trait, but you were just the first to do so.”

“So you don’t think it’s serious?” Matt asked flicking an ear.

“Oh not at all. In fact, I wouldn’t worry about it at all. If you feel the need to make that sound, Pidge, you go right ahead. Same goes for you too, Matt. With the both of you mixed with the same animal you will likely experience similar instinctual actions.”

“Thank you so much, Coran. This helped a lot,” Pidge said her wings folding around herself slightly.

“Not a problem, number five. Happy to help! Would you like me to inform the other paladins of the sound?”

“Uh, sure,” Pidge said, “Best to have everyone on the same page I guess.”

“Alrighty then, will do! Anything else to note beside the bleating?”

“Um…there may be something out here with us.”

“How do you mean?”

“Matt saw something in the fog, but it was too big to be the rabbit that eventually came out of the fog.”

“Hmmm.” There was a pause. “The only thing that I know of that could account for what you saw, Matt, is one of the rare Kleptheltins. They are a species of Lagrey, so rather docile and are the only large animal in your area of the planet. If provoked they will attack, so if you see it again, don’t try to attack it. I wouldn’t worry too much about it. If anything else happens, call in immediately. I’ll have my radio next to me the entire time.”

“Ok. Sorry for scaring you earlier, Pidge,” Matt apologized kicking a clump of grass with a hoof.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s fine as long as everything’s ok.”

“Ok, well, thanks for everything. Bye, Coran.”

“Bye!”

“See you in a few Vargas. Don’t hurt yourselves out there!”

 

Keith kept low to the ground that clung with dew. As the day went on, the fog and mist began to dissipate and give way to a sky of vibrant shades of blue filled with murky white and grey clouds. No sunlight made it through the clouds to the ground so the world was still dim but visible.

Keith evened his breathing and closed his eyes relaxing his mind and slipping somewhere else. Slowly and steadily, he crept forward, his tail propelling him in long smooth bursts.

  
Hunk stood with his eyes closed listening and trying to detect any sign of movement. He shifted his weight, turning in circles.

A smooth fluid hiss escaped from Keith’s lips, but he hardly noticed. He felt one with the ground he slid across. His body long and stretched yet in the perfect position. His tongue slid out of his mouth registering minute changes. He could feel everything. No, he was everything he felt. Oh, he liked this. How could he have ever lived without these remarkable scenes? They were so much a part of him like they had always been there. Every time Hunk rotated, Keith felt his size, his weight, his strength, through the ground itself.

Close, he was so close to where his prey stood. A sitting duck just for him. A willing, slow, sitting duck. And it would taste so good.

He didn’t need his bayard. He was already the perfect killing machine. Honed by pure undaunted instincts. He wasn’t even sure what his name was anymore, only his prey mattered now.

He readied himself, sliding back. A loaded gun with a hand on the trigger. A cat poised to pounce. He surveyed the creature in front of him. Wait, wait, wait, strike!

He leaped outward, claws and fangs readied to sink into flesh.

The prey made some kind of noise, unregistered by the naga as it was tackled to the ground. He landed on top of his prey hissing. His prey laughed and rolled out from under him.

“You really got me there, Keith,” it said, “Great job.”

The naga blinked several times, grounding himself before laughing. “Thanks,” he nodded, “You want to try sneaking up on me now?” He rolled off Hunk.

“I don’t think that trolls are the best at sneaking up on things. I think they’re more brute force and strength. I’d have to check the D&D handbook to be sure though.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t worry about it.” Hunk stood back up and extended a hand to Keith. “Would you say that doing this is helping you with the instincts?”

“I’m getting a better understanding of them, but not a better handle. I keep forgetting things. Or not caring enough to remember them? But they’re important things, like my name  
or that you’re not prey.”

Hunk raised his eyebrows, but shrugged, “Don’t worry about that right now, as long as you snap out of it, which you have been, you should be fine. I think we’re just trying to understand what’s happening for right now.”

“As long as I don’t scratch you.”

“Or bite me,” Hunk pointed out, “We still don’t know if you’re venomous, let alone have an antivenin if you are.”

“I’m still hoping I’m not,” Keith frowned.

“Hey if you are, we’ll both have weird stuff happening with our mouths.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“You want to go again? Or do you want to try something else?”

"Let's go again, and then find something for you to try."

 

“Fifty-four seconds, Lance!” Shiro called out as soon as the centaur crossed the line of stones they had set up earlier.

The open fields cut only by veins of rivers and streams made excellent tracks. They had been using landmarks such as the few trees or rocks to gauge distance and see how fast the both of them could run. Shiro had yet to try his full dragon form but suspected that he would be doing that next.

Lance folded over panting and placed his hands on his front knees walking over to Shiro. “That’s five seconds better than the last one right?”

“Yeah, you’re doing great. Do you want to take a break?”

“Nah,” he swallowed, “in battle, I won’t get to take a break. I need to be able to sprint as hard as I can, for as long as I can. The galra aren’t going to take it easy on us just because we’ve transformed into monsters,” he reasoned taking a swig from his water bottle.

Shiro nodded, “Then go again, but don’t push yourself too hard. I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”

“I’ll be fine. You should run too. Or do something other than just standing there. You need to train too. Get used to that new body.”

He nodded in response. “When you get tired, I’ll work on running as well.”

 

Pidge launched her green spade at her brother’s pole, wrapping the conductive cord around it and pulled. He yanked back and she lost the fight, letting go of her weapon. It snapped back together and fell to the ground. She stumbled and before she could grab it, Matt kicked it away with a hoof. He spun his staff around and whacked her exposed wing with it, not enough for it to hurt.

She lost her balance completely and fell forward. Matt caught her and stabilized her back up right before she made impact with the ground.

“Thanks,” she breathed.

“No problem,” he responded also breathing heavily.

They had been sparing for a while now, just to get familiar with their bodies’ new movements. It was better to figure them out now, then in an actual battle.

“You’ve got to work on controlling your wings. They’re huge targets,” Matt said pointing to the feathered appendages.

“Yeah, I know. I’ve been trying to. They’re just so bulky and pointless,” she replied opening her water bottle and taking a drink.

“They’re not pointless. You can fly with them, Pidge.”

“I can’t now, can I? Besides, what good are they for? Other than flying they just seem like they’re just hulking decorations on my back.”

“No, I’ll tell you what’s a “hulking decoration”. Antlers. You got small ones, be lucky. Look at mine, they’re too heavy and get in the way of sleeping,” he moped grabbing onto one of them and pulling on it.

“I’ll give you that. But hey, they're very impressive for hunting standards.”

“Oh goody, now the bounty hunters after me can have the promise of my antlers tacked to their wall when one of them catches me," he said raising his eyebrows. "Come on, let’s go again and keep those wings in.”

Pidge nodded setting down her water and getting into a fighting stance.

Matt swung his staff around aiming for Pidge’s large feathers. She quickly dogged and leaned back, firing her bayard in his direction. Matt seized the rope and wrapped it around his arm tugging hard and causing her to lose balance. As she fell, her wings unfolded and flapped in an attempt to keep her from falling. She yelped as her feet lifted off the ground slightly for half a second before she crashed into the ground.

“M-Matt. Did-did I just do what I think I just did?” Pidge asked wide-eyed

“K-Katie, that was…flight,” he balked helping her back up, “You-you were flying. Only for a second, but…wow.”

She got to her hooves and focused on opening a wing, giddily smiling. “Y-yeah I guess I was.”

“How do feel now?”

“Shaken? That could just be from sparing. Also dizzy? Is that normal?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. Do you want to sit down for a second?”

“I think I’ll stand.” She thought for a moment before commenting again, “That felt weird…”

“I bet it did.”

“But also… fun. It was only for a second…but it felt so much longer.”

Matt grinned and laughed as he reached down scooping her up, “Check my sister!” he yelled lifting the preyton above his head.

“Matt! Matt put me down!”

“First she’s a paladin and kicking alien butt, and now she can fly! Wooo!” He ran in wide circles gripping her sides so she wouldn’t fall.

Pidge kneeded his arms while she subconsciously flapped her wings to get away, “Matt! I’m not seven anymore. Put me down!”

He laughed and set her down, “Sorry, Pidge.”

She elbowed him in the ribs causing him to fall down. Matt smiled and sat back up.

“Hey, if you want to learn to fly, you should probably build up muscles in your wings. Try to do that again but don’t use your arms.”

She sighed and smiled, “Fine, but if I learn how to use my wings, then you have to find a use for your antlers. Deal?”

“Deal,” he grabbed her hoof tipped hand and yanked her down with him laughing.

 

Vargas later when the star that served at the planet’s sun was low in the sky and painting the clouds thousands of colors, Coran hailed everyone and called the groups back to the castle. He met them at the same place they left and instructed them to change out of the day’s clothes.

“Other than Pidge’s new sound, I trust everyone’s day went smoothly?” Allura asked as the inhabitants of the castle converged around the table for dinner.

As everyone rattled off the list of their newly explored traits, the Holt siblings exchanged a knowing look as they rested their spoon in their vaigaria root and Kelffliib soup.

“Oh god, what?” Shiro groaned, his wings going slack and sliding against the floor. “I know that look. If I had a nickel for every time you made that face and then did something  
that got you in trouble, Matt…”

Pidge laughed, “I think our parents would agree with whatever came at the end of that sentence.”

“You can relax, Shiro, we didn’t do anything wrong,” Matt confirmed.

“Well…”

“Ok, so Pidge and I were sparing to work on dogging, right?”

“Yeah, and I lost my balance-”

“And I got to try to grab her but…”

“I caught myself. By flying!” Pidge grinned opening her hands.

Lance dropped his spoon into his bowl leaving his mouth open. “You what!”

Keith blinked in surprise. Allura folded her hand and leaned forward in curiosity. Shiro went completely still save for his own wings involuntary twitching. Coran grinned giddily like a child on Christmas.

Hunk’s tail flicked and his eyes widened, “Like, with-with wings, not just like an expression. You actually like flew, in the sky. Like-like a bird?”

“Well, kinda. It was only for a few seconds and I fell afterward and I could barely hold it and it was only like an inch above the ground, but, yeah,” Pidge rambled, “I did.”

“That’s great, Pidge,” Shiro said smiling.

“This is excellent news,” Allura agreed, “Perhaps after we are done on this planet, we can move to one of the ones Coran and I have selected?”

“Why wait?” Asked Hunk. “The has to have some kind of ventilation or cooling system of some kind. That could generate enough wind power that would let them practice and get  
the hang of flapping at the least.”

Coran’s eyes lit up. “Indeed we do, my boy. I never thought of using that. However, the fan could prove dangerous should something go wrong. We could try turning off the gravity and have them try it without moving. It would help them to build up the necessary muscle groups.”

Shiro looked over at Pidge. It looked like she had done a one-eighty from her previous stance of being anti-flying. She eagerly listened to every word, chiming in about how she didn’t know if they even needed to build the mussels. How great was flying, Shiro wondered. If Pidge had only gotten a taste of it and now she was all for doing everything to do it again… It reminded him of the kids he had seen at the Garrison who had gotten into drug use itching for their next fix. He wanted to do it, he realized, he wanted to fly.  
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he felt the soft and pleased purr of the black lion.

The black lion.

She had wings! If Shiro had trouble, he could just ask her! Oh, now he really needed to try flying. If nothing else, it would likely help strengthen their bond.

“Regardless, if we try anything, we should try it tomorrow,” Allura cut through. “While I recognize that you are excited, we all are, you have had a long day, and require rest. Especially you, Pidge and Shiro. So why don’t we train in the castle tomorrow? That way, you can practice fighting and, if Shiro and Pidge, are ok with it, you can watch them working with flying. Sound good?”

“I think that sounds great,” Hunk replied.

“So, will you?” Matt asked Pidge.

“Will I what?” she said giving him a quizzical look.

“Let me watch. I am your older brother. It’s my job too. Whether or not you say yes.”

“Well, I was going to say that it’s fine with me. Shiro?”

“Of course. I can’t promise it will be entertaining for you, Matt.”

“Oh, please,” he slammed elbow down on the table and then his head onto his hand with a grin, “If this is anything like astronaut training, then this will be good.”

Shiro glared at him swishing his tail, “I hate you.”

“You love me and you know it, Takashi,” he winked.

“And I just can’t seem to get rid of you.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IMPORTANT! Hey, so due to availability to the internet/laptop/technology and how busy I am going to be for the next few months, despite it being summer, it is going the be incredibly hard for me to update this. There are two options: 1. hiatus, this would not be fun for me or you but might be necessary because of the other option. 2. I can still update, but there would be major issues with this. I know that updates have been few and far between, but I have absolutely no control over my life during the summer really. I don't have access to my laptop. I'm away at summer camps and classes for a good part of the summer or I am visiting my relatives. What this means is that I will try my very best, but updates will likely have: long waits between them, a slightly different writing style, more grammatical errors and will probably be shorter as I will probably be writing on my phone and will not have access to any of the software that I use for editing. So, what would you rather have me do?

Shiro was stuck. Stuck as a dragon. A dragon who couldn't control his own actions. A dragon with his real self trapped in his own mind buried deep with no help.

He was back in that arena. Back in that hell. That place that reeked of death and misery and pain. Where he had butchered people so they wouldn’t butcher him. And all for show. All for entertainment.

This time, no wicked faces gleamed down at him awaiting the kill. It was empty. And that somehow made it worse.

And this time, he was not fighting those he had killed or had harmed or maimed. This time he fought he friends. 

The other paladins and Matt were still human as they attacked. But he fought them back with a fury that was anything but. A fury he couldn’t control. It was not his.

Pidge attempted to wrap him up but the best she had gotten was his wing. She sent a pulse of electricity down the green cord shocking and irritating him. Matt wacked anywhere he could. Aiming for his head, stomach, or whatever part of Shiro’s body had the least amount of armored scales. Lance and Hunk shot at him with a deadly aim. Getting in shots that singed his scales and burned the skin beneath. Keith slashed anywhere he could get his sword. Cutting into the chinks in his scales and carving his flesh.

"Please!" He screamed in his mind. “You’re hurting me! Stop! Please!”

His mouth didn't make the movement or show any signs of breaking the growl he was locked in.

It was not his own. This was not his body anymore. He was not the one in control.

Lance fired at Shiro’s wing, tearing a hole in the membrane narrowly missing his bones. Whatever was commanding him only got angrier and more aggressive. He-it- let out a roar that bounced off and rolled around the walls.

He tried to stop his claws as they caught Pidge and threw her into a wall. He wanted to catch her as her eyes widened in alarm before her head slammed with a sickening thud. He didn’t want to look at the trail of crimson her head left as she crumpled. Didn’t want to watch as it pooled and slid down her shoulder. Didn’t want to see it stain the floor.

“No! Stop!” Shiro pleaded but there was no sound. No reaction to what he was yelling. He pounded and wailed and screamed and shrieked. Nothing.

Matt howled an anguished battle cry and charged the dragon, his staff slamming into Shiro’s side. He pounced and slashed him with his claws. Blood sprayed and Matt screamed out in pain. Shiro roared in his face and finished cutting through his best friend.

Shiro clawed at any sense of control he had but found none. He sobbed crying out, “No! No Please! Stop! I don’t want to hurt anyone! I don’t want to kill anyone else!”

He tried to stop himself as he snapped around and grabbed Hunk by his midsection using his mouth. He wanted to stop that thing inside him when it shook the yellow paladin fervently like a dog with a toy and bit down hard.

Hunk screamed in agony and blood dripped and pooled from his body.

Inside Shiro sobbed and screamed crying out to save his family.

Lance ran to Hunk's side weeping.

“Traitor,” he screamed at Shiro who only growled louder, “You’re an animal, a monster!” His blue eyes were filled with anger and sadness. Something Shiro knew too much of.

That blue boy was next. Shiro ran over and sunk his claws deep into his side before Lance could react. His body fell limp on top of Hunk and for good measure, Shiro whacked the spines on his tail down over the boy’s heads.

Keith was the last.

Shiro slowly stalked towards him, tail swinging low to the ground, wings open wide. Blood marked his body and glowed in the purple lights. Sparks danced and flirted up his throat.

A fire for the red paladin. How fitting.

Smoke drifted out of his nostrils into the air.

"You're a monster!" Keith yelled swinging his sword in high arcs. "You’ve killed everyone!"

Shiro sobbed inside himself, trapped somewhere.

He opened his mouth wide. Growls echoing around the room.

"I'm next, aren't I? So just do it! Kill me! Just do it already!"

So he did with Shiro screaming to back him. Flames ignited and spiraled out. Blocking his vision. Engulfing both him and Keith. This was how he was meant to go. He had killed his family and now he deserved to die. Going down in a fire of his own making. In true pain and agony.

Shiro shot to his feet breathing heavily. He looked down at the floor he had been laying on, white tile. White walls with blue accents rising up around him.

He was in his room in the castle. A dream, it had been a dream.

He had been sleeping in dragon form, and it was all just a dream.

A thin line of tears cut its way down from his purple eyes.

He stood up on all fours and tucked his wings into a comfortable position.

Taking in deep breaths, he tried to calm himself. Pidge, Lance, Keith, and Hunk, fine, they were all fine. He was safe too, but that wasn't what was important. They were in the castle. They were safe, fine. Alive.

Unless they weren’t fine. Unless there had been an attack. What if they were in danger? Or worse.

No, no, that’s silly, the alarms would have gone off. I just need to get my mind of that nightmare.

Shiro began pacing around his room. Everything had been too small for him after the transformation, his room included. Granted, there wasn't much space in the rooms for little more than sleeping and few personal items, but that had never been an issue before. No one else was having problems getting themselves into rooms.

Well, Lance and Keith were having their own issues with fitting places. Even Pidge found herself trying to cram her wings in places.

Were they ok? He knew they were, but something in the pit of his stomach protested. He had to protect them.

Shiro sighed, stupid dragon instincts. He already felt responsible for everyone, this just made the whole thing worse. In myths, dragons were always protective, whether it be for their hoard or their damsel in distress. But Shiro didn't have anything shiny to guard and both of the women he lived with could more than take care of themselves, no distress there. But some gut feeling plagued his thoughts.

There had been several nights where he didn't sleep and instead took small naps during the day to make up for it. It looked like tonight was going to be one of those. The lack of sleep only made the forced shifting worse. Matt and Keith would not be happy with him.

God, he hated having these weird feelings shoved into him.

The motion sensors opened the door allowing him to walk out. He opted to keep in his dragon form. Being human for long periods of time became rather draining. The same happened to Pidge perhaps even more so than him.

The door slid closed behind his tail and he proceeded down the hallway.

He still had not gotten used to all the weird things his new body did as he walked. Just like how humans swung their arms when they walked or ran, his tail would swish back and forth. He could control it if he wanted too, but it felt wrong not doing it. He had discovered the previous day with Lance then he ran, his toes would curl between gaits as well. There were a few other things, like his uncontrollable chuffs and growls he would make, but everyone now had things like that.

Shiro made the decision to go to the main bridge. It had the biggest observation window and seeing the stars was just as relaxing as it was from Earth.

As he entered the room, he was surprised to see someone there. Great, he wasn’t in a peculiarly good mood for people. He paused and breathed in, closing his eyes. By the time he opened them, his artificial arm was clicking into its other shape. That part of him always took the longest. It was also the only part of him that hurt when he shifted. It was just a sharp pinch around where it connected to his stump. Nothing compared to the excruciating pain that everyone had first experienced when they transformed.

He reopened his eyes and inspected himself. He noted more scales than normal and a slight difference in his hearing, so they were probably still like they were when he was in his full form. Both he and Pidge had realized that the more well rested they were, the more human they looked.

"Oh! Hello, Shiro!" Coran said turning from his place in front of a control type panel as Shiro entered the room.

"Hey, Coran. What are you still doing up?" He asked walking over to him. A wing subconsciously tried to wrap around Coran.

"Oh, you know, running diagnostics, making sure the castle is running smoothly!" He replied in a proud sounding manner. "You?"

"Can't sleep. I just wanted to take a walk. How's it doing?" He shifted his weight and wrapped his tail around his ankle. That was also a weird impulsive thing he now did.

"It?"

"The castle?"

"Oh! Oh, she's doing just perfectly. The particle barrier and other defense systems are online, and don't require any maintenance for the time being."

"Well, that's good."  Just hearing that there was nothing wrong with the ship was a relief to hear. It had taken quite a beating in the past few months.

"I…I don't mean to prod, Shiro, but is there any way I can help you with the sleeping problems that you have been having?"

Shiro swallowed, "No, I don't think so. I just keep having nightmares about my time captured by the Galra. This whole monster thing has just made it worse."

"From what you earthlings have told us about dragons, I'm not surprised.” Coran paused and ran his hands over the cool metal of the control panel. He sighed. “For what it’s worth, I'm so sorry that this happened to you. I can't imagine what it would be like if I suddenly turned into a sculerwiltirthan."

"Sculerwiltirthan?”

"Ah, this sort of worm-like creature with tentacles and whatnot. It’s from Altean legends."

"Oh...for the record, I think you would be something much better than that," Shiro said trying the be a little upbeat to help his mood. It wasn't working.

"Hmm," Coran hummed tapping a few other controls absentmindedly.

Silence fell between the two as they gazed out at the stars. The only sounds were control's soft beeping noises and soft drum of the engines.

Coran inhaled hesitantly. "I get them too. Nightmares I mean. About Altea, the day we-we were defeated and Allura and I went into cryosleep."

Shiro looked at him surprised to hear this. Coran only looked at the ground.

"I lost my family that day. I had two sons, one daughter. All adopted. They were so young. They tried to evacuate with everyone else.” His voice broke. “I told them that I was going to stay. That I was doing to fight. That I’d see them on the other side. B-but the Galra… they-they attacked the ships they were on. The escape pods had no defenses to fire. Not enough shielding to help them.” He looked back up at the stars, his eyes glistening. “I miss them every tick."

Shiro placed his hand on Coran's shoulder, "I had no idea. I'm-I’m so sorry. I wish I had asked sooner. If… if you ever need to talk, we're here for you."

"No," Coran looked back at him, "don't be sorry. It's not your fault. It's why I want to fight the Galra. Their memories give me strength. I will see them again in, what I hope, is many decaphebs. Until then, I have another family now."

Coran smiled with a bittersweet pain, his eyes reflecting the blue light.

"And speaking of family, I cannot allow one member to be uncomfortable. I believe I have something for you."

He turned back to the control panned and clicked a few buttons. A panel slid out revealing itself to be a tablet.

"Ah! Here we are!" He tapped lightly until a screen divided into eight sections showed up. "This is the security feed from each of our rooms. The two empty ones are ours!"

He beamed as if their previous conversation had never happened. Save for the still wet eyes with a hidden pain behind them.

Whatever had been unsteady and squirming inside of Shiro was soothed and calmed down once he looked at his screen. He could see his team. And they were ok. Now he could guard them, watch over them. He smiled down at the feed.

Lance was laying on his side, his second and first backs curling to form a U shape. He was breathing deeply with his mouth wide open. Keith had curled up, coils spilling off the bed. He was hugging the end of his tail with a faint smile on his face. Two blankets were wrapped around him and another discarded on the floor. Hunk was laying on his back snoring loudly. He was also drooling a little but eh, cut the guy some slack with those tusks. Matt was also on his back. His head was tilted to the left because of his antlers. His ear poked out of his messy long hair and landed on the side of his face. Shiro smirked as it twitched occasionally. Pidge also slept in her full monster form. She was on her stomach with her legs extended out in the "spread eagle" position. Her wings were slightly wrapped around her in addition to the blankets. Allura was sprawled out on her stomach as well, hair sticking out in every direction. The mice slept around her each with their own smaller blanket.

With being a monster came the new instincts. Everyone was still discovering new ones and learning how to cope with them, but Shiro couldn't calm his own. They just felt so strong. He felt responsible for everyone before they transformed, turning into a dragon made him so protective. The physical changes, while terrible and annoying, could be dealt with. The instincts could not. Resisting them only made things worse. Humans had them, but you know how to deal with them, everyone has them their whole life. These ideas and impulses were just suddenly crammed into their brains, into their lives, with no help with coping with them. No way out, no one to understand exactly what you were thinking or processing. It would make him sick occasionally, he knew everyone could more than protect themselves, but it wasn’t enough to know they were ok, he had to see it for himself. Instincts suck.

"Thank you, Coran. You have no idea how much this means to me," Shiro said handing the tablet back to him smiling gratefully.

"No no, that's yours," Coran informed pushing back to Shiro. "I'm glad I could be of service. Now, let's get you back to bed. Big day for you tomorrow."

He patted him on the back between his wings with a smile as the pair walked out.

Lance blinked open his eyes. He felt slightly disoriented and his vision was still bleary from sleep. As he rolled over, hooves sticking up into the air, he realized, he was in the air himself. He was floating. No, that wasn’t it, the gravity was malfunctioning. Alarm shot through him and he was fully awake.

Items were suspended in the air everywhere. His jacket had drifted off its hook and was levitating in place. Gaming consoles hovered around the room, wires lazily arched and bent.

Ok, he thought, physics. What do I remember from physics? In zero-G...I need a force to move. Newton’s first law right? Or is that the third? He made an attempt to right himself into an easier to navigate position.

“Ok, just… got… to…Got it!” He wedged himself into the corner he was by and held on. He lifted a back hoof and placed it behind him. Once it was in a comfortable enough position, he moved the other and bent them. Taking a breath, he sprang out from the wall and gently glided across the room on a trajectory to the door. He wildly failed his arms to make sure the motion sensor would detect him before he rammed into the door. Somehow, he managed to dodge his flying possessions.

It slid open and he flew into the hallway. He bumped into the adjacent wall, bouncing off and back into the now closed door.

“Hello! He yelled, “Anyone else having problems with gravity?”

A resounding thud followed by a metallic bang came from Keith’s room. As well as some agitated hissing.

“Keith?”

“Lance? What’s happening?”

“Uh…I’m not sure. I woke up and the gravity was broken. Come out of your room, can’t hear you through the door very well.”

After a minute of silence and an eventual resigned “Quiznak”, Keith spoke back up ”Uh Lance? I’m kinda stuck,” he admitted.

Lance blinked in confusion but still said, “Hang tight. I’ll come help you.”

He planted his back hooves firmly on the closest wall and pushed off again aiming or Keith’s door. Sensing his waving hands, the door opened. Lance drifted in without issue. Until he needed to stop that is. He wound up careening into the smooth tiled wall that stood opposite to the doorway. He bounced back off at a downward angle and bounced off the floor. He began to slow as he neared the ceiling.

“Well, that worked. Somewhat,” he griped, “Gonna have some nasty bruises from that.”

Keith was hovering inches from the ceiling above his bed and clutching his blanket. His tail swished repetitively as if following some kind of unheard beat. It reminded Lance of a fish moving its fins in the current.

Once Lance had made it to Keith he asked, “So, how are you stuck?”

“I can’t move there’s no gravity. I don’t have any legs to push off the walls like you do. Slithering is gravity dependent,” he explained shivering. “And I’m cold.”

Lance nodded, “Oh, right, that makes sense.” He kicked his legs, almost trying to stabilize himself as he let go of the wall he had been using for support. “Well, it looks like I’ll just have to give you a ride.”

Keith’s eyes went wide in shock. “What, no. You don’t have to do that. I’d be too heavy. I just need some help getting out of my room.”

“And what’s your plan from there? Besides, no gravity, no weight.”

“Uh...”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. There’s plenty of room. Hop on.” He patted his horse back reassuringly. “Plus, you’re cold. This should help warm you up. Kill two birds with one stone and all that jazz.”

“Ok, fine… I still think I’m too heavy.” He hesitantly grabbed onto Lance’s shoulders and carefully swung his tail around, like he was sitting side saddle. “I’m ready,” he told Lance.

“Uh, no. Your tail is too long for you to sit like that. I don’t want to kick it or have it get stuck or whatever. You’re going to fall off. If you still had legs, or even less body mass, you might be able to stay on, but that’s not enough of a hold to keep you on with the included size of your tail. Wrap it around like a boa constrictor or something. Just don’t squeeze too tightly.”

Keith nodded and readjusted his tail accordingly. “That better?”

“Yeah, I just don’t want you to fall off. All ready to go?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok, then just relax and get comfy.”

Lance again planted his hooves, aimed for the door, pushed off, and glided smoothly through and out into the hallway. With no one else in their rooms from what he could tell, he manured in the direction of the main bridge.

As he glided down the halls, Keith nuzzled into Lance’s back, pulling the fabric closer to his face, humming and closing his eyes. “You’re so warm,” he cooed lazily.

Lance giggled and kept moving.

When they reached the main bridge, the pair found it devoid of people.

“Ok, uh, Keith? You awake back there.”

The naga shifted his weight and lifted his head. “Mhh.”

“Ok, good, I’m going to try to call everyone over the intercoms. I don’t know where they would be, but they have to be in the castle. They wouldn’t have left without us.”

Lance grabbed hold of the nearest control panel and pulled them over to it. He brought up the control buttons and selected the communications board and then the intercom button. A holographic blue microphone popped up.

Lance spoke into it, “Ay! Anyone home! Or did everyone get blasted out into space? Keith and I kinda want the gravity back!”

“I can’t move without it,” Keith said sleepily.

The screen in the front of the room flashed on overlapping the swirling blues of the planet outside. Coran’s face appeared with the training deck behind him.

“Sorry about that, numbers three and four! We turned off the gravity to let Pidge and Shiro test out their wings in a more controlled environment. We wanted to let you two keep sleeping, but I guess that the artificial gravity stabilizers must have glitched and shut it off for the entire castle instead of just one or two rooms. I must have been so busy setting up a small localized patch in the training room that checking the rest of the castle must have completely slipped my mind. I’ll get on fixing that right away! Why don’t you come on down, we’ve only just got started.”

“Alright, Coran. We’ll be right down,” Lance said.

“Wonderful! I’ll get that gravity working properly in no time!”

“Thanks, Coran,” Keith said and the screen switched off.

“Can we wait until the gravity comes back on?” Keith asked.

“Sure.”

Keith unwound and flicked the tip of his tail as he burrowed back into Lance’s nightshirt.

“Comfy are you?”

“Shut up. You’re warm. Much more warm than the ground is,” he grumbled, “It’s always cold.”

Lance chuckled, “You know, if you’re that cold, I don’t mind warming you. I have a lot of body now and it’s all making heat.”

“I think that’s overstepping every boundary.”

“Well, we’re teammates. I can’t have you freezing to death! Besides, it’s bonding…or something.”

“Well, in that case, you won’t remember it will you?”

“Oh c’mon! I hit my head really hard that night; I still don’t remember all of it.”

Keith laughed, “Sure you don’t, Lance.”

As if right on cue, gravity came back on, and everything fell. Including Keith and Lance. Keith’s tail was crushed under the weight of Lance’s horse body. Lance hurriedly scrambled up using the control panel for support. His hooves slipped and skidded as he tried to right himself without hurting Keith. Or at least any more than he already had. As Lance propped himself up, Keith unwound himself and quickly slid out.

“Sorry about that. You ok?” Lance asked still not off the ground yet.

Keith, who was still laying on the ground on his side, replied, “Yeah.” He inspected his tail over. I might have a bruise, but nothing broken, he thought to himself.

He got to a standing height and extended down a hand to help Lance up.

“Thanks,” he said taking his hand and hauling up his bulk.

“Don’t mention it. Now, let’s go see our leader crash into a wall,” Keith smirked.

“But first, climb back on. I’m told that I’m warmer than the floor.” Lance grinned with a wink.

Keith rolled his eyes but lifted himself back on anyway.

“Thank you by the way. This helps a lot.”

“Well, I did just crush you with my horse butt so it’s the least I can do.”

When Lance and Keith arrived, rejoicing at touching the ground Hunk explained the full extent of the plan. It was decided that the best way to help Shiro and Pidge get used to the motion of their wings, was to switch off the gravity. They would be tethered to the ground so they wouldn’t move but still be “flying”. The high ceilinged training deck provided enough space for them to go as high, or a low, as they wanted. The observation room would allow the other paladins and Alteans to watch, offer advice, and pull them back if need be. After getting used to the movements, they would switch back on the gravity and instead just blow wind at them, enough for them easily to sat aloft, but not be harmed.

So earlier that morning, while Coran had left to turn off the gravity Allura, Matt, and Hunk tied Pidge and Shiro’s midsections with something similar to the cord in Pidge’s bayard. It was strong, but would not hurt them, only make Shiro’s scales feel cramped and agitate Pidge’s fur, but there was nothing they could do about that.

“N-no, Pidge, try to synchronize your wings,” Allura shouted over the speaker system.

“I’m trying!” she yelled back. Flapping her wings, causing a few feathers come loose.

“She says she’s trying,” Matt translated, cringing at the erratic, almost frantic movements his sister and Shiro were making.

The large, practically bulky, clump of spines at the tip of Shiro’s tail altered his balance as he tried to steady himself. He instinctually moved his tail, as if he was trying to steer, as he flapped. However, instincts are not the same thing as expertise, and both Pidge and Shiro were sorely lacking in just that. Shiro would steady himself and flap his wings twice before moving his tail in a bold confident downward stroke. He had his wings coordinated, but that was about it. Using any other appendage, including his head, would alter any semblance of proficiency. If he beat his tail too hard, he would topple head over heels and begin to spin.

Pidge was not in any better shape. Despite the spur of the moment success she had experienced the previous day, her wings simply refused to obey her commands. She would try to move them both into an upward position, but one would lag or move fast enough to keep up with the other. Unlike the fingers in Shiro’s wings that were sturdy, relatively simple to maneuver with, and offered support through his whole wings, Pidge’s feathers didn’t offer much control. She didn’t know how far she was supposed to splay her feathers. Everything felt wrong when she moved her tail feathers too. The longer feathers seemed to offer no actual purpose other than to be in the way. They didn’t help with steering or really any other function. She could feel them tailing out behind her and sensing every vibration that went down them. Small feathers, coverts she believed they were called, shook themselves out but couldn’t fall without gravity. So instead, they formed a cloud around her.

With another beat, Pidge threw her wings down as fast as she could. Her left wing came down before her right causing her to spin and tilt. She felt like a miscoded robot.

“Shiro, try not to use your tail until you get the hang of just moving your wings,” Allura suggested into the mic.

Coran put his hand over it. “Ah, princess, are you sure that’s such a great idea? If he has the instinct to move his tail then it’s probably for a good reason.”

“I want to see if he can do it.”

“Princess, I don’t think this is working. Maybe we should just try it with the wind,” he said with a concerned look.

“Gravity might be essential to flying,” Hunk said. Keith nodded having just experienced how essential gravity was to the movement of some animals.

“Yeah, this isn’t the result what we had in mind,” Matt said biting his lip, “They’re going to hurt themselves.”

“When Pidge was flying yesterday, she was doing it purely out of instinct it sounds like. They might just be overthinking it with the lack of gravity. While I’m not suggesting we do what actual birds do and shove them off a cliff, but I don’t think this helping any,” Lance said pointing at Shiro who was careening in the direction of Pidge desperately trying to slow himself down.

“You’re right,” Allura agreed. She took back the mic from Coran. “Paladins, we’re going to turn back on the gravity. This is not working like we hoped and is likely making things worse. Please shift prepare to be pulled back.”

Coran nodded and left the room heading to switch on the gravity.

“Oh thank god…” Pidge sighed relaxing and dropping her sore wings. “That was agonizing.” She shifted and twisted herself into a better position.

Shiro made an affirmative sounding growl and closed his eyes allowing himself to shift.

Matt laughed and began to reel in the line that held his sister in place while Hunk did the same for Shiro.

Seconds later, the gravity came back on and everything floating fell back to the ground.

“Glad we’re done with that,” Pidge said as her and Shiro’s ropes dissolved into light.

“Agreed. I don’t think that I gleaned anything helpful from that,” Shiro said flicking his tail.

“You were losing a lot of feathers out there, Pidge,” Matt noted, “Let me see your wing.”

“I think it’s fine,” she said trying to open one. It twitched and came out some, but since it was still getting used to the return of gravity, not to its full extent.

“Here,” Matt gingerly gently took hold of her wing and carefully extended it. He looked it up and down, searching for any gaps or bent, twisted or tangled feathers.

“Ok, this one looks fine,” he said letting go and allowing her to fold it back in place. “Can I look at the other?”

“Matt, is this really necessary? Birds loose feathers all the time. I’m sure there’s nothing wrong with my-”

“Just let him look,” Shiro interrupted gritting his sharp teeth. Stupid protective instincts he thought.

“Ok. Geeze…” she let Matt grab hold of her wing and open it.

“Nothing wrong with this one either,” Matt reported patting it and rubbing her back between her wings. “Just normal molting.”

“See, I’m fine.” Her ear flicked in annoyance.

“Better safe than sorry,” Matt replied, “but I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Yeah,” Lance said selecting a fallen feather off the ground, “I mean if you’d have already damaged your wings, then we’d really have a problem.”

“Indeed,” said Coran, “Even if you could fit into a healing pod, they haven’t done a wing before, so it is likely there would be an error.”

“So, if we’ve stopped trying it without gravity, then what is the plan now?” asked Shiro.

“The wind machine,” said Hunk almost embarrassed to admit the idea.

“You want what?” asked Pidge in a shocked tone. “I couldn’t get my wings to work standing on the ground. I don’t think it’s exactly safe to try it in a wind tunnel at the moment.

“Well, try to use them now, Pidge. You too Shiro,” Allura said.

Shiro’s wings felt like pins and needles but he still tried to move it. It lifted slightly but in the end, did not move as he wanted. He frowned and swished his tail in some kind of agitation. “Sorry, princess, I don’t think I could try that again right now.”

Pidge tested her own pair again, her back and muscles around them felt somewhat tight and stiff. They shifted and twitched but in the end, did the same thing. “Same thing here.”

“Well, they are perhaps just readjusting or strained after that shock of being moved like that for the first time. We have other activities for everyone to do.”

“Like what?” asked Keith raising an eyebrow.

“We need to get your top running speeds and how much weight you can hold too,” Coran replied with a smile.

“Like running on a treadmill?” asked Lance.

“A what?”

“I don’t quite know how to explain what one is.”

“It’s an exercise machine that has a tread or something kind of like a conveyer belt that is pulled at different speeds. You run on top of the tread so you don’t fall off,” Hunk helped.

“It’s really helpful for people who want to go running and have nowhere to do it,” Matt pointed out.

“Oh, yes. Well, we don’t have exactly that. Our version is a whole room and is only used for scientific purposes,” Coran explained. “Unless you want to move large weights, then we can go there.”

“I like the running option better,” Lance said

“Well, horses do like to run,” Pidge joked.

“Actually, I’ve been feeling a bit antsy,” he admitted, “Being out yesterday helped a lot, but I’ve still felt like I’ve been… I don’t know cooped up. Like, do you know that kind of, almost potential energy, feeling in your legs when you haven’t moved them in a long time? It’s a bit like that.”

“Why didn’t say you were feeling like that?” asked Shiro placing his arm on the teenager’s shoulder.

“I don’t know. It didn’t seem all that important. I couldn’t even piece together precisely what I was feeling either.”

“But it is, Lance. We care about what’s happening you, not only on a physical level but mentally too,” Allura protested.

“Yes, Lance, it’s not a bother to anyone here,” Coran said, “Allura and I’s job right now is to help you understand these new changes and hopefully reverse them.”

“I know,” his said laughing slightly, “Now can we go running?”

“Of course.”

“I’m curious to see just how fast you can go,” Pidge said.

“You’re not going to watch, are you?”

“You get to watch me fail at flying.”

“But that’s different.”

“You’re right, it is. It’s worse.”

They entered a room down the hall from the main training room. The space was split with a small room that contained what appeared to be a control panel similar in style to the ones on the main bridge. Beyond the glass pane was another much larger area. The floor looked like a large treadmill without any handles or control buttons.

Lance took his place in the center of the tread and gave everyone thumbs up saying that he was ready to begin. Coran selected a low setting to begin with. The floor under Lance’s hooves began to slowly move backward. He according adjusted his speed as Coran moved the setting higher until he was at a trot. Lance inhaled and exhaled, feeling the thrum of his hooves. He again signaled for the speed to be brought up.

Running felt amazing. Coran kept bringing the speed up until it was as fast as it could go. Lance’s legs entered a rhythm with a grace he did not have just walking around the castle. Sweat dripped off his brow as he whooped in joy and exhilaration. A fan turned on and whipped his fur and hair around.

For the first time since turning into a centaur, Lance felt right.

Burning filled Hunk’s lungs after he had been running for about 25 minutes. His heart rate monitor’s timer beeped and Coran lowered the speed until it stopped. Hunk doubled over with his hands on his knees.

“Th…Thanks…Coran,” he panted tail going numb.

“You ok there, big guy?” asked Lance as Hunk collapsed into a chair once he had made it back into the room where everyone else was.

“Yep, just…just need to…take a breather here.” he closed his eyes and leaned his head back.

“Well don’t hyperventilate, ok?”

“Noted,” he huffed.

Next came Matt. Running felt rather awkward at first, but soon he found out how to position his center of gravity. His strides were longer than they had been before making him need to edit the way he put down his legs and how much energy he needed to expend. Running felt nice after the first five minutes. Better than it would have normally felt. He had never been an athletic person by any means really, just barely passing the physical part of being an astronaut. But he felt much more coordinated running now. Sure his hooves weirdly slipped when they touched the ground. And maybe the new ways his legs bent made him feel off. But, strangely, it didn’t bother him. He picked up speed as he got the hang of his new movements and began to smile slightly. But soon his lungs ached and he remembered that he had mild asthma.

Keith volunteered to go next, just to get it over with. He doubted he could run as fast as he did before. The ground beneath his tail slowly moved backward. He matched his speed and slithered. His scales felt strange on the rubber tread. He didn’t feel slippery but still felt like he would stay balanced for long. The scales on his underside gripped and pushed him forward, his body swaying with the motion of his tail. He couldn’t go fast, but he didn’t get tired in the slightest during the whole session.

Pidge went after, beginning in her more humanoid form. Her wings, now back to normal, became awkward and a burden when running. Her hooves slammed into the moving floor, the vibration moving up her body and jostling her wings out of place. They were heavy and pulled her back. Even when her wings were folded in, her tail created some kind of friction. It caught the air at annoying angles making her tilt slightly in one direction or the other. However, she learned to work with it. Once she found the interval, she would rotate her hips and block the air to correct the lean. It became second nature after the first ten minutes. As soon as she got the hang of it, it felt great. At the end of it, she was breathing hard, sweating, and smiling.

“Alright, Shiro. Your turn,” she panted moping sweat off her face and flopping down into a chair, “I’m going to take a break while you go.”

Shiro nodded with a smile. He strapped on the heart rate monitor and entered the running room. Coran started up the conveyer belt. Shiro also found his wings to be bothersome, but his tail. It bounced and swayed with his motions. The large clump of spines began to open and close with the wind. Almost like it was trying to steer him. Eventually, he stopped trying to fight it and instead let it do what it wanted. The spines splayed out and his tail felt lighter, much less of a burden. He could get used to that aspect.

When his turn was up, Pidge rose out of her chair. As she walked, she worked on shifting. One moment she was lifting up a foot, the next she was placing down two hooves. She had been working on being able to fluidly shift as fast as possible and it was paying off. She still took a little longer to turn into a human, but she had zero problems going into her monster form.

“Dang, you’re getting good at that,” Lance commented.

“Thanks, I figured that I should be able to shift as quickly as possible in case I need to do it in battle,” she replied smiling and sliding her wings forward slightly. “I don’t quite have the hang of getting back yet. Always take me longer.”

“Well it’s certainly working,” he said after Matt translated, “Maybe you should give Shiro some pointers.”

“Maybe.” She walked over to the door and suddenly realized that she couldn’t open this one. With all the doors she went through on a day to day based being equipped with motion sensors, she hadn’t encountered this before. She sighed, “After somebody opens this door for me.” looked over for some help.

“Oh, sorry, Pidge,” Matt said leaning over her and pushing the door open.

“Thanks,” she said embarrassedly she probably would have been blushing from embarrassment if deer could blush. God, this whole thing is just so humiliating, she thought as she got in position.

The tread moved under her hooves starting at a walking pace. She had no problem keeping up with the speed, hardly thinking about the fluid moments that had become so natural, all while still feeling deeply wrong, over the past few days. Coran slowly increased the speed making her hooves go faster and faster. Soon, it was too fast for her to be just speed walking. She then realized that she had no clue how deer were supposed to run. Mercifully, the speed did not go higher so she tried to run.

She watched her front legs as the pounded down frantically as she rambled in her mind about how to run. Ok, ok, I don’t need to have my back legs and front coordinated the same way right? Well, it sure isn’t like human running. I know that both feet need to leave the ground when you’re running, but is that the same for deer? What if I can’t do this? What if I’m not meant to do this? What if my wings are too bulky for me to be able to run like a deer would normally?

No.

No, I can’t think like that. I can’t think like that at all. I can’t think. Just…just listen to the-my instincts. She shut her eyes and gave into the fierce rumbling and electric churning in her chest. It felt like something had opened up and was exploding in bursts of light. It flooded her whole body and she gave into it.

Her legs moved in a way that she hadn’t thought of as a possibility. Her back legs made her sprang up causing her to be in the air for just a moment before her front legs crashed down on to the tread in front of her. At first, she kept making herself go too high into the air which in turn made her crash down too hard and hurt her hooves. However, through trial and error, after her first few rough strides, she got the hang of her body’s movements.

Soon she was actually having fun! She found that she couldn’t actually run a straight line very well. She’d noticed Matt having the same problem, but less than her. As soon as her hooves hit the ground, they bounced back up again. She felt like they were made of rubber. But it wasn’t uncontrollable somehow.

She adjusted her speed as she saw fit. As she did so, her wings instinctually shifted their positions forward. She kept her wings in, but her feathers slightly extended out. Perhaps it made her more aerodynamic? Whatever the purpose, she felt great!

As she ran and picked up speed she whooped in joy. It felt freeing. It felt like something was unfurling in her chest and making her feel lighter. It was a pure feeling that she couldn’t put an exact word too, much like all the other new and bizarre feeling she’d had the past weeks. But by no means, however, was it bad.

When her time was up, she didn’t feel winded, only exhilarated, if not slightly sore.

Keith opened the door for her and she pranced in.

“How was it?” asked Coran.

“Yeah, it looked like you were having a lot of fun out there,” Shiro agreed.

“That was amazing,” she said beaming, “Weird, but amazing. I gave into my instincts and it actually felt great!”

“Can’t understand you, Pidge,” Lance said.

“Oh, right. Sorry, sorry.” She closed her eyes and breathed in deep. After about forty-five ticks she reopened her eyes and was back in her humanoid form.

“As you were saying?”

“That felt great! I can see what you mean about the being cooped up thing, Lance. That was freeing.” She stretched her arm and looked over at Matt, “You’ve got deer in you  too, what did it feel like for you?”

Matt smirk and said, “It felt good until my lungs decided they didn’t want to be lungs anymore.” Allura and Coran gave him a confused and startled look. “Don’t worry, I’m fine. But no, it felt good. Weird like you said, but good.”

“Yeah, did you feel like your hooves were slipping the whole time too?” asked Lance.

“Yes! But not to the point where I could fall,” he replied gesturing with his hand.

“Exactly!” Pidge exclaimed.

Coran cleared his throat with a smile, getting everyone’s attention, “Whenever you’re ready, Shiro.”

“Alright.” He walked into the other room and shifted.

Like Pidge, his wings also slightly extended as he ran. He stuck his neck out and leaned forward. His tail bobbed and weaved in rhythm. It didn’t feel as bizarre as it probably should have felt. So much of him had changed in just the two years since being captured by the Galra. He doubted anything could phase him at this point. Turning into a dragon does that to a person. Still, exploring new muscle groups in his freaking tail, was up there.

He didn’t experience the same rush that Lance, Pidge, and Matt had, but then again, he probably wasn’t built to run. His frame was slim, yes, but it was more muscular and as such wasn’t as agile as he was in a humanoid form. But that could also be attributed to the sheer difference in size. It was much easier to move 180 pounds than 1,080.

He didn’t mind really, what he lacked in super speed, he made up for in flexibility. It was something that he was only recently exploring, but he had noticed that he could bend and twist his spine and other body parts to an extent he never could. He imagined that it was for quick or steep turns in flying. Not that he needed anything to accommodate for the fact that he was a freaking dragon, and could do all the accompanying things.

When Shiro’s time was up, he felt tired, but no more so than he would if he had been running in any other form. Once the track stopped moving, he closed his eye and began trying to shift. Once he finished, he reentered the observation room with a light smile.

“How did it go?” asked Allura.

“Good. It didn’t feel any different really. The four legs thing’s still a bit odd, but I can manage,” he explained rubbing the scales on the back of his neck.

“Alright!” Coran exclaimed, “Who’s ready to look at data!”

“I’m assuming that we don’t have much of a choice in that,” Lance joked leaning over Coran's shoulder at his data.

“Course not, my boy. Now, let’s start with yours then. You have an increased speed of course, with the fastest speed today being 12 kelflops. However, this could increase if you want to improve upon it and work hard.”

“How fast is that in Earth terms?” asked Shiro.

“Roughly 25 miles per hours,” Pidge calculated in her head.

“Or about 40 kilometers per hour for metric users,” Hunk said putting a finger to his chin and thinking.

“Or 11.176 meters per second if we’re using more technical terms. Ain’t that right, Shiro,” Matt said flicking his ears and tail with a smile.

“This isn’t the Garrison, Matt.” Shiro’s tail tapped the ground. “But yes. That sounds right.”

“What else is new?” asked Lance.

“Well, as you may have noticed, your body is great at running a short distance quickly, but cannot keep up the same speed for a very long time. Chances are this will come in handy on missions.”

“I can practically guarantee that it will,” Lance agreed.

“In the event of doing some long distance running, you need to remember to pace yourself or else you will tire and the results could be bad. This is the one instance where I will encourage you to fight against an instinct,” Coran said sternly.

Lance nodded, “I understand.”

“Hunk, your running hasn’t seemed to have changed. You should still have the same abilities in that regard.”

“Well that’s good to hear,” he said leaning back against the room that was now beginning to feel too cramped. Keith had cured his tail up as small as he could, Lance was trying his best not to rub his thighs against anyone, but he kept bumping into Matt. Matt didn’t notice really, and if he fully did, he didn’t mind. Pidge and Shiro’s wings kept whacking into everyone. Both were actually a little agitated about it and kept apologizing. Tails and feathers were caught in the undertow and would get stepped on but it was all just a bunch of accidents.

“Keith,” Coran said looking over his data, “you don’t have same speed that you once had, unfortunately. This is going to prove itself an issue during battle for you.” He looked Keith in the eye, his voice tinged with something that sounded like sadness and sympathy. “Much of your previous fighting strategy depended upon your agility and skill with a sword. The sword aspect shouldn’t have changed…but the speed has. From what you have told us, snakes can be fast sometimes when they, what did you call it, strike? So perhaps this can help with actually landing a hit in, but probably not with going distances. I don’t have a solution to this right now, but we will find something to help compensate for this.”

“I understand,” Keith said glancing down at his tail. He didn’t know what he was going to do either.

“Matt, I have good news, your running skills have improved similarly to Lance’s in regards to distance. You don’t have the same speed, you’ve had an improvement instead. You too Pidge. However, you will need to take more breaths in order to supply oxygen to all your cells for cellular respiration to occur. Just remember to breathe. Lance, you won't have this problem because of your secondary lungs.”

“My what now?” he asked giving Coran a confused look and taking a step back.

“Your secondary lungs.” He stepped over to Lance’s side. “Much like how you have two hearts, you have four lungs. This just makes sure that your body gets all the air it needs to continue its normal functions. You may have noticed that you take deeper breaths now, but other than that and being able to hold your breath longer, it’s completely normal.”

Lance processed this new information while he shuffled his hooves on the ground. It made sense that he would have four lungs. Something had to fill his horse body, it couldn’t just be empty space, muscle, and fat. What else did he have down there?

“Does anyone else have anything like that?” he asked finally.

“Well, in her preyton form, Pidge has a four-chambered stomach and Shiro has, what I can only describe as an air sack for flight,” Coran replied, “Pidge have you eaten anything in your other form, Pidge?” 

“No…what exactly does a four-chambered stomach mean for eating?” she asked wordily, wings, tail, ears, and nose all twitching.

“Well, I’m not entirely sure, but in the past animals, or really anybody, that I’ve encountered and have a similar structure, would have to chew their food twice,” he explained looking for the best words.

“Excuse me?” She raised her eyebrows in a combination of disbelief and a bit of fear and anger even.

“Typically this means that once the food that has been the first time, it will be brought back up to be chewed again.”

“So I’m going to throw up in my mouth?” she crossed her arms and said sternly, almost like an order, “Coran, that’s disgusting.”

“Well, yes, I’m afraid so, but look on the bright side,” he smiled and gave a shrug, “It will give you something to do while you’re bored.”

She groaned and leaned her head back, “Does Lance also need to do this?”

“No, he just has one large stomach similar to his human one.”

She groaned louder.

“Sorry, Pidge, but it’s just something preytons do,” Coran sympathized placing his hand on her shoulder.

“No, Coran. Preytons don’t exist. Dragons don’t exist. Centaurs don’t exist. Satyrs don’t exist. Trolls don’t exist. Nagas don’t exist. None of what we are should exist!” she yelled wings going stiff. She hated that she could feel them. Hated that she had them. Hated that she wanted to use them. Hated being like this. “I just want to go back to normal.”

No one spoke at first. Everyone agreed.

“It’s just,” she inhaled sharply, “I never agreed to this. This isn’t what I wanted. I never wanted to have my DNA reworked, I never wanted to be a monster. I don’t want to be an animal. A deer! And I know you two are trying, but It’s just not the same.”

“What’s not the same?”

“Everything. Our whole lives. It’s all messed up. We can’t do the same things that we always could. We can’t be the same people because of this. Our very person is not the same. I know for Alteans things like shapeshifting seem normal, but on Earth, they’re not. To humans, they’re not! People don’t just grow wings and tails and turn into monsters!” Pidge sucked in air, “This isn’t just something that we can just live with and ignore.”

“I just want to go back to normal,” Lance said looking down dejectedly.

There was a moment of silence.

Keith silently picked up his jacket from where it had been placed on a hook on a wall, slowly turned and left.

Lanced swallowed and followed suit, hooves clopping loudly down the hall followed by light sniffing.

Hunk stood there fidgeting for a moment longer before sighing and apologizing. He left too, his tail swishing behind him.

Coran gave Matt a tablet with the rest of the data on it. “I’m sorry. I’m so so sorry.” He hung and shook his head and left the room.  Allura followed him closing her eyes and feeling helpless.

Pidge turned and left in the opposite direction, wings wrapping around her arms gripping around her chest.

Shiro looked at Matt sadly and swallowed. He didn’t know what to say.

“I…” Matt sighed, his ears drooped and brushed the fur on the sides of his face, “I should…should probably go and talk to her…”

“Matt…” Shiro moved over to him. He wrapped his arms around him. Matt leaned into Shiro’s arms. Upon accepting his embrace, Shiro enveloped Matt with his wings and his tail slid around Matt’s ankles. He didn’t mean for it to happen, it just did. Stupid dragon instincts.

“I’ll talk to you later if that’s ok,” Matt whispered.

“Of course,” Shiro whispered back.

He left and, deciding to give Pidge some alone time first, he knew what he needed to and step one was letting her calm down first. He walked down the hall into the room he’d been staying in and was unofficially his. He wasn’t technically a resident of the castle, but he also wasn't technically a resident with the rebels at the moment. He always stayed in the same room at the castle, and he couldn’t fight well yet, so there was no need for him to go back to the rebel fighters yet.

He took off his shirt and made his way into the bathroom. With a sigh, he turned on the water, deciding that a shower would help him calm down and clear his mind before he went to talk to his sister. Steam rose out from the crack in the shower curtain. That was the nice thing about Altean showers, instant hot water.

After he was done rinsing shampoo out of the fur on his legs, he switched off the water and grabbed the towel he set out. He vigorously rubbed his fur trying to get off the water out. It dripped despite his best attempts. He gave up and just toweled off his hair instead.

He walked into the other room and pulled out a clean comfortable shirt. This one was a light grey with three rounded overlapping stripes, one green, one orange, one an almost yellowy color, and white lines leading to the upper left corner. He walked out into the hall and made his way to the door to Pidge’s room.

He swallowed and knocked three times. “Hey, Katie. It’s Matt I uh… “ he sighed, “Can we talk?” he rubbed the fur on the side of his arm.

There was the sound of blankets moving and then hoof steps on the floor. The door unlocked and slid open to reveal Pidge standing in the doorway. Her hair, fur, and feathers dripped too giving away that she had also just taken a shower.

“Hey,” she said looking down and off to the side. “Come on in if you want…” She stepped away letting him pass. Only then did he notice the random scattering of feathers dotting the floor and the items on it.

“Pidge? Where did all these feathers come from?” He looked her in the eye worriedly.

“They fall out when I sleep,” she grumbled as she cleared her bed off for a place for them to sit.

“No, really, where did they come from?”

“I told you, they just fall out.” She sat down and extended a wing. “See? My wings are fine.”

“They may be, but you’re not. Talk to me, just like we did back on Earth, tell me everything and just rant. Get it out of your system. You can’t keep it all bottled up.” He hopped down next to her. “Tell us, what’s the word with Katie Holt?” He pretended to extend a microphone the way an interviewer would.

“Matt,” she half groaned half laughed.

He gave her a half-hearted smile and lowered his hand, “Just tell me.”

Pidge’s wings slumped and unfolded against the bed. She sighed and tugged at her shirt. “I can’t do this, Matt. She crossed her arms and shrunk in on herself. Matt wrapped his arm around her shoulder. “I just can’t. This isn’t like other things I’ve dealt with.”

“I know.” He rubbed her back in small circles between her wings.

“I can’t do any of normal things that I used to do. I can’t open doors, hold anything. You’re the only one who can understand me when I’m a deer. And I turn into…into this thing! His thing that, not only shouldn’t exist, but I’ve never even heard of! I can’t even control it all the time! And when I can, it’s not in the way that would have wanted to. The whole thing is-it’s mortifying! I mean I can deal with all these things by themselves. Not being able to talk, ok, I can deal with that, you can translate for me. Significant height difference, whatever, I’ve always had that. Losing a whole finger, really sucks, but in the end, I can deal with it. Itchy annoying fur, just wear short sleeves and tank tops if I get too hot. But what really sucks is not being able to do normal things. Matt, Matt I hate this!”

Pidge leaned in on her brother and started crying. Matt wrapped his arms around her.

“And I just-Matt! Look at me!” She cried, “I’m a monster! An animal!” She hung her head and dropped her voice to a whisper, “I’m not even a person anymore.”

Matt rubbed her back in small circles, brushing against her feathers and patches of fur. Her small body shook with sobs. Matt’s heart broke and tears stung his eyes and began run down into his fur again. His shoulders trembled as he hugged tighter. They stayed there for a moment before Matt leaned back keeping his hands on Pidge’s shoulders.

“I’m sorry, Katie. I’m so so sorry. But don’t say that. You’re still a person,” Matt looked her in the eyes with a sad and stern frown.

“People don’t look like this last time I checked,” she mumbled.

“Humans don’t, but people can.” Pidge gave him a confused look. “What I mean is. You don’t have to be human to be a person. Just look at Allura and Coran, or even the Galra, they’re a far cry from human biologically, but that doesn’t make them any less a person. Or do you want to be the one to break the news to the Alteans?”

Pidge laughed weakly and swallowed, “That still doesn’t change the fact that I’m a monster.”

“No, but you’re not what comes to mind when people think monster; not the definition that people like to use. It’s not the same definition. People on Earth, and I’m sure on other planets, get called monsters all the time. Sure, none of the are preytons, or satyr, or centaurs, or dragons, or… whatever, but that’s not what makes them monsters. It’s actions. We may be biologically monsters, but we’re the same people we always were. We just have some… modifications, but we’re still the same. And don’t you forget it.” He smiled.

Pidge reflected his smile. “Thanks.” She realized something, “Hey, you called yourself a satyr, not a faun this time. Did you decide or figure out which one you are?”

“Hm? Oh, yeah, I guess I did.” He rubbed the back of his neck and grabbed onto one of his antlers. “There’s really not much of a difference in the two, but yeah. I guess I…I don’t know, just feel like it fits better. Besides, in mythology, fauns were always drunk on wine, too care free or harassing women. At least I think that’s right. Somehow I feel like I’m not intoxicated 24/7.”

She laughed. “I don’t know…You could have gotten into all kinds of hijinks while I was still looking for you…”

“Ah yes,” he said sarcastically, “let me tell you all about the wild parties I got into and the long trail of broken hearts I’ve left in the stars. It’s quite the tale.” He rolled his eyes and ruffled up her hair. “On a more serious note, if you need to talk again, just tell me. Don’t hesitate, I’m all ears.” He wiggled the furry things for emphasis.

“Heh, thanks, Matt.”

“Feeling better?” he asked shifting his weight and standing up..

She nodded, “Yeah. I’m sorry I blew up.”

“It’s understandable, completely understandable. But, I would apologize to Coran and Allura if you’re up to it.”

“Yeah,” she sighed and stood up next to him, “I’m gonna go do that.”

Pidge left her room in search for the Alteans. After what felt like an hour of guilt building on her after she thought about what she had done,  she eventually found them on the control bridge. They looking over future battle plans for a factory. She swallowed walked in the room, wings and ears drooping. She cleared her throat and they turned around, facial expressions mixed.

 

“Allura, Coran, I’m sorry,” Pidge said hanging her head. 

 

Coran frowned softly, Allura crossed her arms.

 

“I didn’t-I mean,” she sighed, “I was rude. And angry. And overall mean. And I don’t want you to think that I’m angry with you, or anyone else on the ship. I just...needed to get out all my anger and frustration and all the other emotions I’ve been dealing with. I didn’t mean for you to be on the other end of it. It just happened. So, I’m sorry.”

 

“Pidge, it’s completely ok to be angry and frustrated by this,” Allura said, “and I know that without anything concrete to direct all those emotions it must just make it worse. But, we’re just trying to help you understand everything that’s happening.”

 

“I know, I’m sorry.”

 

“You don’t need to keep apologizing, number five,” Coran said with a slightly happier tone, “we know you didn’t mean anything to offend us. It’s easy for us to forget just how different our two cultures are. We’re so similar that it’s hard to remember that we are in fact aliens to each other.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! Thanks for reading! feel free to leave comments and tell me if you see any typos or grammatical errors! Have a nice day!


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